CHRISTIANITY 
IN  THE  NEW  ACE 


«LX  E.HERMAN  X$ 


OCT  30  1919 


BR  121  .H47  1919 

Herman,  Emily,  1876-1923. 

Christianity  in  the  new  age 


CHRISTIANITY  IN  THE  NEW  AGE 


CHRISTIANITY  IN 
THE  NEW  AGE 


OC'  19 


BY  \  Av 


E.    HERMAN 

Author  of  "  The  Meaning  and  Value  of  Mysticism,"  etc. 


NEW   YORK 
FUNK   AND    WAGNALLS    COMPANY 


My  Minister  and  Friend, 
REV.    IVOR   J.    ROBERTON,   M.A., 

who  taught  one  "  whose  eye  is  Beauty's 
powerless  slave "   to   discern  the   Beauty 
of  the  Sanctuary,  and  under  whose  war- 
time preaching  this  book  took  shape. 


PREFACE 

"  It  is  no  small  prudence  to  keep  silence  in  an 
evil  time/'  says  Thomas  a.  Kempis  ;  and 
though  the  dark  night  is  past  and  the  day  of 
victory  has  come,  silence  still  commends  itself 
as  a  counsel  of  discretion.  For  this  is  ra  time 
of  obscure  and  tangled  issues,  of  the  seething 
turmoil  of  new  and  dying  tendencies  and  the 
blind  struggle  of  unborn  and  half -born  impulses. 
What  we  took  to  be  an  ordered  map  has  re- 
solved itself  into  a  chaos  of  crossing  lines,  and 
the  only  thing  to  be  asserted  with  confidence 
about  a  complex  of  life  and  thought  so  full 
of  intricacy  and  contradiction  is  its  utter  im- 
predicability. 

Yet  it  is  precisely  at  this  stage,  when  our 
early  confidence  in  our  ability  to  read  the  signs 
of  the  times  has  been  shattered,  and  we  have 
resigned  ourselves  to  tread  an  unknown  path 
(sobeit  He  who  leads  us  does  not  remain  un- 
known), that  there  have  come  to  some  of  us  a 
discernment  of  the  root-causes  of  our  past  failure 

vii 


Preface 

and  present  weakness,  a  perception  of  our  funda- 
mental needs,  and  a  vision  of  the  great  Source 
of  reinforcement  and  renewal  which  were  not 
ours  in  the  days  of  our  comparative  certitude. 
We  have  learnt  to  acquiesce  in  an  obscurity  of 
events  and  ambiguity  of  movements  which  before 
we  have  deemed  intolerable  ;  but  our  acquiescence 
is  not  the  dull  submission  of  pessimism.  It  is 
born  rather  of  the  quiet  trustfulness  of  those 
whom  the  smaller  uncertainties  of  a  fleeting  crisis 
have  driven  back  upon  the  larger  certainties  of 
that  permanent  reality  which  gives  that  crisis 
its  meaning  and  value.  To  keep  silence  con- 
cerning the  things  which  have  thus  come  to  us 
may  be  in  accord  with  the  promptings  of  a  justi- 
fiable diffidence  in  face  of  a  responsible  task,  and 
with  the  counsels  of  a  less  creditable  prudence. 
But  deeper  than  all  such  considerations  is  the 
conviction  that  it  is  precisely  at  this  so  perplexing 
time  that  the  most  faltering  voice  that  can 
speak  of  "  a  sure  word  of  prophecy"  amid  the 
Babel  of  conflicting  pronouncements,  and  of  a 
vision  of  the  Desire  of  Nations  walking  upon 
the  troubled  waters  of  the  world's  life,  has  the 
burden  of  utterance  laid  upon  it.  Out  of  such 
a  conviction  this  book  is  sent  forth. 

viii 


Preface 

In  the  nature  of  things,  a  volume  dealing 
with  the  exigencies  of  the  new  age  upon  which 
we  have  entered  must  be  largely  critical.  The 
effect  of  prolonged  war  has  been  to  fling  a  sharp 
and  inexorable  light  upon  the  seamy  places  of 
our  religious  life,  to  shatter  many  idols  and  destroy 
many  illusions.  To  ignore  this  in  the  supposed 
interests  of  reconstruction  is  to  make  anything 
like  valid  reconstruction  impossible.  I  have  there- 
fore begun  by  pointing  out  in  Part  I.  certain 
"  Perils  of  the  Threshold  "  :  an  impatience  with 
the  past  which  is  threatening  to  rob  us  of  our 
present  vision,  and  a  tendency  to  pessimism 
which  spells  paralysis.  Nor  have  I  hesitated  to 
introduce  the  element  of  diagnosis  into  subsequent 
chapters.  To  know  and  ponder  our  present  state 
is  not  merely  the  first  step  towards  amendment, 
but  such  knowledge  often  carries  the  whole  secret 
of  reconstruction  within  itself. 

In  Part  II. — "  The  Christian  Message  to  the 
New  Age  " — I  have  endeavoured  to  express  my 
sense  of  the  Church's  urgent  need  to  recover  her 
teaching  function.  We  have  for  so  long  played 
with  such  catchwords  as  "  dead  knowledge,' • 
M  abstract  thought,"  and  "  barren  intellectualism," 
that    we   have    all   but   forgotten   how  vital   a 

ix 


Preface 

thing  religious  knowledge  can  be,  what  world- 
moving  dynamic  lies  latent  in  right  thinking. 
"  Learn  to  think,"  said  a  shrewd  man  ;  "it  will 
profit  you — there  is  so  little  competition."  We 
are  waiting  for  a  Church  that  will  teach  us  how 
to  think.  It  is  for  want  of  the  type  of  religious 
instruction  that  promotes  hard,  honest  thinking 
that  so  much  religious  devotion  remains  blind, 
so  much  noble  sacrifice  devoid  of  moral  power, 
so  much  strenuous  endeavour  lacking  in  intelli- 
gent purpose.  That  the  Church  must  once  more 
resume  her  teaching  office,  and  that  in  her  teach- 
ing she  must  concentrate  upon  the  great  funda- 
mental realities  of  the  nature  of  God  and  the 
meaning  of  the  Cross,  is  writ  large  in  the  experi- 
ence of  all  who  have  come  into  contact  with  our 
fighting  men.  For  too  long  the  pulpit  has  tended 
to  avoid  central  issues  and  to  decline  upon  the 
minor  moods  and  tenses  of  the  Christian  ex- 
perience. To-day  it  is  borne  in  upon  us  once 
more — and  in  painful  fashion — that  the  Church 
lives  by  her  message,  and  that  the  Church  without 
a  message  concerning  God  and  the  Cross  is  dead 
while  she  liveth. 

In  devoting  Part  III.  to  the  consideration  pf 
Christianity  as  "The  Great  Adventure,"  I  have 


Preface 

sought  to  emphasise  three  cognate  needs,  always 
present  yet  never  so  sharply  recognised  as  to-day. 
Much  that  has  hitherto  been  considered  necessary 
for  the  persistence  of  Christianity  many  are  now 
prepared  to  surrender  with  more  than  equanimity  ; 
but  three  things  we  must  have — an  adventurous 
individual  discipleship,  an  adventurous  theology, 
and  an  adventurous  Church.  Believing  that 
the  free  religious  personality  is  fundamental  to 
Christianity,  I  put  in  a  plea  for  a  new  religious 
individualism.  Haunted  by  the  spectre  of  the 
eighteenth-century  fiction  of  the  isolated,  self- 
contained  individual,  we  have  tended  of  late  to 
lay  a  vicious  emphasis  upon  the  corporate  life 
of  the  Church,  exalting  the  corporate  Christian 
consciousness  as  if  it  were  in  opposition  to  the 
individual  consciousness,  a  higher  stage  only  to 
be  reached  by  the  sacrifice  of  individual  interests. 
Such  a  contention  rests,  I  am  persuaded,  upon 
an  essentially  materialistic  conception  of  the 
Church,  regrettably  reinforced  in  these  days  by 
the  popular  comparison  of  the  Church  to  an 
army,  and  perpetuating  the  most  un-Catholic 
element  in  the  Roman  ideal  of  the  Church.  The 
true  Church  is  founded  upon  free  Christian 
personality,   and   stands   for   a   living    theology 

xi 


Preface 

and  for  an  adventurous  policy,  very  little  con- 
cerned about  securing  the  continuation  of  its 
existence,  but  supremely  concerned  for  the  King- 
dom of  God. 

I  am  indebted  for  stimulus  to  the  fine  body 
of  religious  war  literature,  especially  to  those 
two  notable  volumes,  ''Faith  or  Fear?"  and 
"The  Church  in  the  Furnace."  A  re-reading 
of  Professor  Oman's  profound  and  far-seeing 
book,  "  Vision  and  Authority,"  has  greatly  helped 
to  confirm  and  clarify  a  conception  of  the  Church 
towards  which  I  had  been  struggling  for  some 
years. 

My  warmest  thanks  are  due  to  my  husband, 
who  has  read  the  manuscript  and  made  many 
valuable  criticisms  and  suggestions,  and  has 
also  revised  the  proofs. 

E.  H. 

London, 

January,  191 9. 


Xll 


CONTENTS 

PART  I 
Perils  of  the  Threshold 


CHAFTER 


i.  Detachment  from  the  Past        ...  3 

2.  The  Snare  of  Pessimism     ....  ^30 

PART  II 

The  Christian  Message  to  the  New  Age 

3.  The  Church  as  Teacher     .         .         .         .53 

4.  The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God      .  79 

5.  The  Highway  of  the  Cross        .         .         .105 

6.  The  Cross  and  the  Altar  ....  126 

PART  III 
The  Great  Adventure 

7.  The  Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology  .  163 

8.  The  Call  for  Adventurous  Discipleship  .  196 

9.  The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church     .  224 


PART    I 
PERILS  OF  THE  THRESHOLD 


CHRISTIANITY    IN    THE 

NEW    AGE 

CHAPTER    I 

DETACHMENT   FROM   THE    PAST 


Every  great  crisis  in  history  appears  to  those 
who  pass  through  it  as  a  cleaving  sword  severing 
the  past  from  the  present.  Yesterday  recedes 
into  antiquity  ;  to-morrow  is  seen  as  the  first 
chapter  in  an  entirely  new  book  of  life.  In  the 
shaking  of  things  that  can  be  shaken,  things 
that  cannot  be  shaken  vanish  from  view.  The 
law  of  evolution  seems  no  longer  to  operate  ; 
the  idea  of  continuity  appears  untenable.  From 
the  narrow  island  of  the  present  we  gaze  across 
to  the  continent  of  the  past,  and  find  it  hard  to 
realise  that  only  a  little  while  ago  the  strip  we 
stand  on  was  part  of  that  mainland  which  already 
seems  so  strange  and  shadowy  in  the  haze  of 
distance.  When  we  are  told  that  our  insulation 
must  spell  impoverishment,  we  reply  with  an 
incredulous  smile.  Things  have  happened  over- 
night, as  it  were,  which  our  arm-chair  philosophers 

3 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  antiquarians  little  reck  of.  New  and  un- 
familiar problems  have  arisen  such  as  the  past 
never  knew,  and  therefore  cannot  help  to  solve. 
A  new  vision  and  a  new  demand  have  created 
a  new  mind  that  cannot  work  with  the  old  tools. 
This  sense  of  sudden  and  forcible  detachment 
from  the  past  has  been  characteristic  of  all  great 
historic  revolutions,  but  perhaps  it  has  never 
been  so  widespread  or  so  acute  as  at  the  present 
juncture.  True,  it  does  not  emerge  with  equal 
sharpness  in  all  classes  and  types  of  men.  In 
the  case  of  what  is  conveniently  termed  "  the  man 
in  the  street,"  it  has  not  wrought  so  palpable  a 
change,  for  "the  man  in  the  street"  has  never 
been  distinguished  by  an  historical  mind.  On 
the  contrary,  his  lack  of  imagination  has  caused 
him  to  hold  tradition  in  unmitigated  contempt. 
For  him  the  dead  were  always  in  the  wrong,  or 
rather  they  did  not  exist  at  all,  for  his  concep- 
tion of  human  solidarity  is  limited  by  the  circle 
of  the  living.  Nor  does  this  sense  of  cleavage 
emerge  most  strikingly  in  quarters  more  or  less 
dominated  by  scientific  ideas.  For  the  scientist 
the  past  is  certainly  of  great  value.  He  freely 
uses  its  discoveries  and  achievements,  and  takes 
its  struggles  and  aspirations  into  full  account. 
He  does  not,  however,  attribute  any  binding 
authority  to  it  ;  his  attitude  is  completely  free 
and  critical.  He  rejects  the  findings  of  the 
past  whenever  the  facts  of  the  case  demand  it 
without  the  ghost  of  a  regret,  let  alone  a  scruple  ; 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

and  while  he  may  admire  and  even  reverence 
its  achievements,  he  never  does  so  on  the  ground 
of  their  venerable  antiquity.  It  is  indeed  only 
when  we  turn  to  the  Christian  community  and 
to  the  circle  of  those  who  are,  often  unconsciously, 
influenced  by  Christian  teaching  that  we  see  the 
full  effect  of  an  upheaval  that  has  cut  time  in 
two. 

For  Christian  thought  has  always  gloried  in 
its  historical  continuity.  The  Church  has  lived 
and  moved  in  an  atmosphere  of  tradition  and 
symbolism.  Theologians  have  ever  been  dis- 
tinguished by  a  strong  and  sensitive  historical 
instinct.  When  the  mind  of  the  age  challenged 
theology  with  being  inadequate  to  the  demands 
of  the  time,  they  contended  that  such  inadequacy, 
where  it  existed,  was  due,  not  to  an  exaggerated 
reverence  for  the  past,  but  to  a  failure  to  grasp 
and  interpret  it  aright.  Similarly,  when  critics 
of  the  traditional  Church  organisation  emphasised 
its  utter  failure  to  attract  the  masses  of  men, 
they  invariably  attributed  that  failure,  not  to  a 
vicious  adherence  to  the  old  forms,  but  to  an 
inability  to  enter  into  their  spirit  and  thus  adapt 
them  to  modern  needs. 

But  within  the  last  three  or  four  years  this 
attitude  has  received  a  rude  shock.  War  has 
revealed  a  situation  it  can  no  longer  meet. 
In  being  brought  face  to  face  with  "  Tommy/' 
we  have  made  the  disconcerting  discovery  of  a 
whole  nation  radically  estranged  from  traditional 

5 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

forms  of  Christianity.  The  comforting  reflection 
that,  after  all,  soldiers  are  abnormal  and  ephemeral 
appearances,  destined  to  vanish  into  thin  air  at 
the  first  touch  of  peace,  did  not  bear  a  moment's 
scrutiny  ;  for  Tommy  was  not  a  soldier  in  the 
old  sense  of  the  term  :  he  was  simply  a  student, 
a  clerk,  or  a  mechanic,  in  khaki.  He  existed 
before  the  war,  and  will  continue  to  exist  after- 
wards. He  represents,  in  fact,  the  great  public 
whose  temper  and  needs  we  had  studied  for  so 
long  from  a  distance,  and  now  at  last  have  been 
given  an  opportunity  of  seeing  at  close  range. 
Our  contact  with  him  has  flung  a  shrewd  and 
searching  light  into  dark  places.  It  has  revealed 
a  soul  of  goodness  in  the  most  unlikely  men,  and 
also  an  uncompromising  opposition  to  conven- 
tional ideals  of  saintliness  ;  an  astounding  ignor- 
ance of  elementary  religious  truths,  and  an  almost 
uncannily  sure  instinct  for  vital  reality ;  a 
wistful  longing  for  a  truer  life,  and  a  humiliating 
contempt  for  conventional  religion.  And,  most 
disconcerting  of  all,  it  has  revealed,  together 
with  a  new  kinship  and  ease  of  approach  along 
all  simple  human  ways,  a  cleavage  in  deeper 
things  between  us  who  represent  the  Church 
and  the  men  who  in  some  respects  are  so  near 
to  the  Kingdom,  which  no  amount  of  mere  ex- 
planation can  bridge.  It  is  easy  to  account 
for  this  cleavage  in  an  historical  fashion,  but 
that  does  not  lessen  its  sheer  intractability. 
After   one   has   succeeded   in   tracing   its   origin 

6 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

and  following  its  development  through  the  long 
series  of  blunders  which  stain  the  history  of 
the  Church,  one  is  still  confronted  with  the  facts 
in  their  unmitigated  grimness,  and  not  a  whit 
nearer  the  solution  of  the  problem.  One  is  still 
face  to  face  with  a  de-Christianised  England 
which  none  the  less  retains  an  instinct  for  Chris- 
tianity, but  an  instinct  to  which  our  religious 
conceptions  and  the  way  in  which  we  express 
them  utterly  fail  to  appeal. 

We  find  no  difficulty  in  believing  that  it  took 
decades  of  preaching  and  teaching  before  a 
people  such  as  the  Chinese  could  be  brought  to 
anything  like  an  intelligent  grasp  of  the  simplest 
Christian  conceptions,  but  since  the  war  we  have 
also  come  to  suspect  that  those  who  will  address 
themselves  in  the  near  future  to  the  task  of 
evangelising  England  must  be  prepared  for  almost 
as  long  a  period  of  sowing  the  seed.  The  popular 
superstition  that  generations  of  Sunday-school 
teaching  and  an  hereditary  reverence  for  the 
Scriptures  put  the  average  Englishman  into  a 
position  to  grasp  the  Gospel  and  its  implications 
almost  instinctively  has  been  finally  exploded, 
and  we  have  come  to  realise  that  the  evangelisa- 
tion of  a  nominally  Christian  country  is  perhaps 
an  even  longer  and  harder  business  than  pioneer 
missionary  work  in  heathen  lands. 

Chaplains  of  all  denominations  confirm  this 
diagnosis.  True,  not  a  few  of  them  find  it  easy 
to  appeal  to  the  men  in  frank,  unconventional 

7 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

talk  about  the  great  realities,  but  it  almost  seems 
that  the  short-cut  to  success  in  talking  to  the 
men  is  to  forget  one's  theological  and  ecclesiastical 
antecedents  ;  and  this  is  full  of  grave  augury 
for  the  future.  The  time  is  at  hand  when  men 
in  whom  a  new  spirit  has  been  kindled  by 
the  homely  and  untrammelled  ministrations  of 
their  chaplains  will  return  to  the  routine  of 
ordinary  life,  and  will  need  to  be  urged  to  seek 
connection  with  some  religious  body  or  congre- 
gation. They  cannot  be  allowed  to  remain  un- 
connected units  ;  nor  can  such  an  organisation 
as  the  Y.M.C.A.  take  the  place  of  Church  fellow- 
ship, for  man  is  destined  to  worship  in  families, 
and  to  put  an  association  intended  only  for  men 
in  the  place  of  the  Church  is  to  create  in  the 
end  a  circumscribed  and  distorted  outlook.  But 
will  these  men  find  a  type  of  life  that  appeals 
to  them — a  type  of  life,  even,  that  they  can 
understand — in  the  average  congregation  ?  Many 
a  chaplain  is  filled  with  misgiving  as  he  looks 
into  the  near  future.  He  realises  that  no  amount 
of  interpretation  and  adaptation  can  make  the 
man  he  has  learned  to  know  in  the  trenches  fit 
into  the  framework  of  the  Church  he  knows  so 
well.  He  thinks  of  those  who,  baptised  in  the 
cloud  of  fire  and  in  the  sea  of  blood,  have  come 
to  the  Lord  and  Redeemer  of  their  life  :  how 
would  they  regard  the  average  respectable  con- 
gregation repeating  the  old  formulae  and  working 
along  the  old  lines,  and  how  would  that  con- 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

gregation  regard  them  ?  He  sees  that  not  adapta- 
tion but  reconstruction  covering  the  whole  range 
of  the  Church's  life  and  thought  is  needed  ;  but 
alas  !  those  who  clamour  for  reconstruction  are 
mostly  without  her  gates,  while  those  inside  are 
either  blindly  complacent  or  waste  their  energies 
in  a  pathetic  effort  to  put  new  patches  on  an 
old  garment.  They  do  not  realise  that  a  new 
task  demands  new  tools,  and  many  of  them  still 
refuse  to  admit  that  the  task  is  new.  Said  a 
young  chaplain  on  his  return  home,  "  When  I 
met  my  congregation  again  and  realised  with 
what  trivial  and  irrelevant  things  they  were 
occupied,  and  how  little  they  understood  of  the 
big,  vital  things  we  had  been  up  against  in  the 
trenches,  it  turned  my  heart  sick  within  me." 

These  words  are  representative.  They  express 
a  feeling  which  is  increasingly  prevalent  among 
men  of  vision.  There  is  a  growing  sense  of  the 
imperative  need  for  reconstruction — the  con- 
sciousness of  a  demand  which  goes  far  deeper 
than  questions  of  organisation  or  method,  and 
whose  central  challenge  is  to  the  spirit  of  the 
Church  rather  than  to  her  institutions — and  there 
seems  little  chance  of  that  demand  being  re- 
sponded to  by  its  membership.  Potentially  the 
future  is  full  of  hope.  There  is  a  new  wistfulness 
abroad  which  is  surely  God's  opportunity,  a  new 
instinct  for  what  is  genuinely  spiritual  among 
those  who  are  ignorant  of  the  current  spiritual 
vocabulary,    and    a    new     appreciation    of    the 

9 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

humility,  the  self-giving  love,  that  are  the  essence 
of  Christianity.  But  over  against  that  there  is 
a  tragic  failure  on  the  part  of  the  average  Church 
member  to  realise  this  state  of  things.  The 
stirring  and  pulsing  of  a  new  life  outside  the 
Church  seems  to  have  no  correlative  within. 


II 

But  while  this  attitude  of  self-criticism  on  the 
part  of  thoughtful  Churchmen,  with  its  demand 
for  radical  reconstruction,  holds  the  promise  of 
a  golden  future,  it  has  its  peculiar  perils.  Born 
of  that  sense  of  cleavage  between  the  past  and 
the  present  which  so  revolutionary  an  experience 
as  ours  inevitably  creates,  it  easily  slides  into 
the  assumption  that  the  present  situation  is 
entirely  new;  not  with  the  newness  of  summer 
fruit  consummating  a  continuous  process  of 
growth  from  the  first  green  shoots  to  the  leafy 
crown  gemmed  with  blossoms,  but  rather  with 
the  newness  of  an  unclassifiable  meteor  flashing 
suddenly  into  the  sky,  whose  genesis  and  relation 
to  the  ascertained  astronomical  system  no  scientist 
can  trace.  And  it  is  inevitable  that  such  an 
assumption,  coupled  with  the  growing  convic- 
tion of  the  Church's  inadequacy,  should  breed 
qualities  which,  if  unchecked,  must  in  the  long 
run  cripple  constructive  thought  and  action — • 
impatience  with  the  past  and  pessimism  with 
regard  to  the  future. 

IO 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

The  times  are  new — of  that  there  can  be  no 
doubt.  History  does  not  repeat  itself  in  any 
literal  and  detailed  fashion,  no  matter  what  the 
old  adage  says.  And  if  each  age,  however  natur- 
ally it  seems  to  have  sprung  out  of  the  preceding 
one,  includes  an  element  of  originality,  how 
much  more  this  startling  day  of  ours,  which  has 
brought  the  collapse  of  long-established  systems 
and  the  emergence  of  ideals  that  are  changing 
the  face  of  the  world  before  our  eyes  ?  Yet  it, 
like  its  predecessors,  is  not  in  its  essence  a  nega- 
tion and  refutation  of  the  past.  Its  reaction 
against  tradition  owes  its  very  strength  to  the 
educative  pressure  of  that  which  it  antagonises, 
and  not  a  few  of  its  most  novel  features  strike 
hidden  roots  into  a  past  remoter  than  the  age  we 
have  just  left  behind  us.  It  must  be  remembered 
also  that  movements  and  tendencies  which,  at 
first  sight,  seem  to  mark  a  new  departure  in  a 
direction  opposite  to  that  of  the  past,  are  not 
seldom  seen,  on  closer  examination,  to  be  a  new 
departure,  indeed,  but  not  at  all  in  the  direction 
to  which  they  seemed  to  point. 

A  notable  instance  of  our  current  misreading 
of  contemporary  movements  is  seen  in  the  case 
of  the  alleged  revival  of  interest  in  the  future 
life.  Before  the  war,  it  might  have  been  said 
of  the  great  mass  of  men  that  they  were  totally 
indifferent  to  the  question  of  a  life  to  come. 
Preachers  found  it  difficult  to  interest  their  con- 
gregations in  the  subject ;   books  on  immortality 

ii 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

had  only  a  lukewarm  reception  ;  novels  dealing 
with  the  whole  gamut  of  theological  questions 
had  little  or  nothing  to  say  about  it.  But  with 
the  sacrifice  of  so  many  young  lives,  the  subject 
once  more  became  of  vital  interest,  and  to-day 
it  looms  large  in  the  popular  mind.  Men  who 
sneered  before  are  now  stretching  wistful  hands 
towards  the  Unseen ;  women  whose  practical 
creed  was  a  dainty  materialism  are  seeking  the 
Land  that  is  very  far  off.  Wherever  a  home  has 
its  empty  chair,  there  the  sorrow-laden  air  is 
murmurous  with  eager,  inarticulate  questionings. 
There  must  be  a  future  life,  cry  a  thousand 
stricken  hearts  ;  for  this  life  is  too  short  and 
narrow  to  hold  the  treasure  of  our  love.  There 
must  be  golden  streets  up  yonder  ;  no  meaner 
pavement  would  be  worthy  of  the  golden  lads 
who  loved  not  their  lives  unto  death. 

But  beautiful  and  ennobling  as  all  this  is,  and 
precious  in  the  sight  of  God,  it  does  not  in  itself 
constitute  a  religious  interest  in  immortality  ; 
and  it  is  with  the  religious  interest  we  are  con- 
cerned. Even  a  cursory  glance  at  current  books 
on  the  subject  goes  to  reveal  this.  Take  Sir 
Oliver  Lodge's  "  Raymond,"  for  instance,  as 
the  book  that  may  claim  to  be  typical  of  its 
class.  It  is  not  concerned  with  the  life  beyond 
in  any  deeply  spiritual  sense.  It  enshrines  no 
prophetic  vision  of  our  eternal  destiny ;  it  deals 
with  no  spacious  and  dynamic  conception  of  the 
Divine  purpose.     Its  object  is  solely  to  establish 

12 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

the  validity  of  certain  messages  purporting  to 
come  from  the  dead.  The  motive  is  not  primarily 
religious  but  scientific,  or  quasi-scientific  ;  and 
the  weight  of  interest  does  not  fall  upon  the 
future  at  all,  but  upon  the  present.  "Does  my 
boy  live  ?  Can  he  communicate  with  me  ?  Do 
those  messages  which  I  receive  really  come  from 
him?"  These  questions — heart-cries  welling  up 
from  the  pure  depths  of  sorrowing  love,  and 
therefore  demanding  our  most  reverent  sympathy 
— are  not  in  themselves  religious  questions  at 
all ;  nor  are  the  answers  supplied  by  Sir  Oliver 
Lodge  and  others  religious  answers.  How  far 
removed,  indeed,  such  inquiries  are  from  a 
genuinely  religious  interest  in  immortality  may 
be  seen  by  comparing  the  temper  and  outlook 
of  a  book  like  "  Raymond' '  with  those  of  the 
Apocalypse. 

The  Apocalypse  is  one  of  those  books  which, 
obscure,  and,  in  one  sense,  remote  from  our  day, 
yet  speaks  to  us  with  no  uncertain  voice.  It 
was  written  for  communities  which  had  precious 
memories  of  their  martyred  dead,  and  it  came 
to  them  at  a  time  when  the  first  passionate  ex- 
altation of  the  age  of  martyrdom  had  given  place 
to  declension  and  questioning,  and  "  doubts 
would  come  if  God  had  kept  his  promises  to  men." 
"  Where  are  our  martyred  dead  ?  "  one  can  hear 
aged  mothers  crying  from  out  the  dim  past. 
"Are  they  indeed  before  the  throne  of  God,  wear- 
ing the   amaranthine   crown   of   victory  ?      Did 

13 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

they  indeed  die  for  an  everlasting  kingdom  ? 
Will  they  soon  return  with  their  Lord?  "  Such 
questions  doubtless  stirred  the  ageless  mother- 
heart  and  troubled  the  mind  of  manhood  then 
as  now.  But  though  they  too  found  their  answer 
in  the  Apocalyptic  vision,  they  were  not  central 
to  its  interest  in  the  life  beyond.  The  Apocalyptic 
vision  is  not  conceived  of  in  the  manner  of  a 
spiritualistic  experiment ;  it  is  a  large  prophetic 
vision  of  the  purposes  of  God  with  the  world. 
Its  symbolism  was  that  of  its  age,  but  it  is  used 
to  convey  an  ethical  and  spiritual  message  for 
all  times.  In  it  the  dead  speak,  not  of  earth's 
trivialities,  but  of  the  noblest  strivings  and  aspir- 
ations of  mankind.  They  appear  as  witnesses, 
not  to  their  own  existence,  but  to  the  grace  and 
truth  that  are  at  the  heart  of  the  Universe. 
Nothing,  then,  could  be  wider  of  the  mark  than 
to  identify  the  present-day  anxiety  concerning 
the  dead  with  the  Christian  hope.  So  long  as 
man  is  human,  so  long  will  bereaved  love  ask 
for  tidings  of  its  dear  ones  beyond  the  veil.  The 
attitude  is  neither  new  nor  in  itself  religious  ; 
it  has  merely  reappeared  to-day  in  a  new  form. 
Whereas  formerly  a  materialistic  science  poured 
scorn  upon  "  supernatural "  phenomena,  and 
spiritualism  was  at  the  mercy  of  superstition  and 
fraud,  science  has  now  recovered  from  its  material- 
istic debauch,  and  is  investigating  spiritualistic 
phenomena  with  open  and  even  reverent  mind. 
That  is  greatly  to  the  good  ;  t>ut  as  we  have  seen, 

*4 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

it  does  not  mean  that  spiritualistic  inquiry  is 
dominated  by  religious  motives.  It  is,  on  the 
whole,  a  hopeful  sign  of  the  times  ;  but  it  does 
not  point  in  the  direction  many  optimists  imagine. 


Ill 

But  of  all  tendencies  which  hide  the  true 
significance  of  present-day  movements  from  us, 
none  is  more  disabling  than  that  impatience  with 
the  past  which  is  the  besetting  sin  of  prophetic 
spirits.  It  is  not  merely  that  these  movements 
cannot  be  justly  estimated,  or  even  recognised 
for  what  they  are,  without  constant  reference  to 
the  past. ;  the  interpretative  and  illuminating 
function  of  the  past  is,  after  all,  not  its  most 
momentous  function,  and  its  exclusive  use  as  a 
medium  of  elucidation  may,  in  fact,  militate 
against  the  more  vital  interpretation  from  the 
standpoint  of  present  insight  and  experience. 
Life  is  not  ruled  by  precedent,  and  it  is  more 
important  that  I  should  be  able  to  read  the  signs 
of  the  times  by  the  light  of  the  Spirit  guiding 
us  here  and  now  than  merely  by  the  reflected 
beam  that  streams  from  the  past.  That  re- 
flection will  surely  serve  to  clarify  my  vision 
and  correct  my  judgment,  but  it  must  never  be 
allowed  to  usurp  the  place  of  immediate  appre- 
hension and  present  insight. 

The  past,  however,  is  far  more  than  a  key 

15 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

or  an  interpreter.  It  is  itself  not  yet  wholly 
elucidated.  It  is  waiting  for  us  to  elicit  its  more 
vital  meaning,  its  fuller  content.  Like  the  Bible, 
which  since  the  war  has  become  a  new  book  to 
so  many,  it  awaits  our  slow  discovery.  We  are 
- — and  rightly  so. — impatient  of  traditionalism. 
Why  should  we  go  back  to  Nicaea  for  our  theology, 
and  to  the  Middle  Ages  for  our  ecclesiastical 
institutions  ?  But  this  is  not  a  question  of 
theology  or  of  Church  organisation  ;  it  is  some- 
thing far  more  primary  that  we  are  concerned 
with.  Is  there  nothing  in  the  past  history  of  the 
Church — in  the  clash  of  theological  controversies, 
the  shaping  of  religious  ideals,  the  history  of 
classic  institutions,  the  action  and  reaction  of 
tendencies  that  have  gone  to  create  rival  schools 
of  thought  and  to  rend  the  unity  of  the  Church 
Catholic — is  there  nothing  in  all  this  that  was 
wrought  and  written,  not  for  its  time,  but  for 
ours  ?  Is  there  nothing  in  Clement  and  Origen, 
in  Augustine,  Thomas  Aquinas,  Luther,  Wesley, 
that  they  themselves  perceived  but  dimly  in  the 
totality  of  its  implications,  and  is  waiting  to  yield 
its  hidden  treasure  to  us  and  to  our  children  ? 

The  question  suggests  the  endless  labour  of 
historical  investigation,  and  we,  who  are  not 
historical  experts,  and  upon  whom  the  shortness 
of  the  time  and  the  urgency  of  immediate  tasks 
press  heavily,  shrink  from  such  slow  processes. 
But  here,  if  anywhere,  the  warning  of  "  more 
haste,  less  speed"   applies,  and  our  instinct  for 

16 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

immediacy  and  short-cuts  has  already  too  often 
wasted  the  precious  time  we  thought  to  save. 
Years  ago  we  used  to  quote  approvingly  the 
Oxford  rhyme  which  informed  us  that 

Greek  flesh-worship,  Roman  luxury  and  sty  of  Epicurus* 
They  will  kill  us  ere   Professor   Caird's   philosophy  can 
cure  us. 

But  we  are  learning  at  last  that  Christianity, 
like  all  vital  'processes,  is  a  slow  cure,  and  that 
its  slowness  is  its  efficacy.  We  are  still  too  much 
under  the  sway  of  an  ideal  of  quick  efficiency 
which  is  typified  in  the  Student  Volunteer  motto, 
"  The  evangelization  of  the  world  in  this  gener- 
ation.' '  A  renewed  study  of  the  Church's  history 
— a  study  not  pedantic  or  antiquarian,  yet  as 
deep  as  mental  candour,  imagination  and  humility 
can  make  it — will  not  only  illuminate  the  present 
with  revealing  light ;  it  will — what  is  far  more 
to  the  point — make  that  original,  long-delayed 
contribution  to  the  present  which  is  the  justifica- 
tion, as  it  is  the  glory, "of  such  study.  Suddenly, 
as  we  trace  the  growth  of  some  dominating  idea, 
or  read  the  deathless  words  of  some  master- 
spirit, it  will  be  as  the  swinging  back  of  long- 
closed  doors,  and  we  shall  enter  into  the  inherit- 
ance that  has  waited  for  us  through  long  years. 

An  age  of  democracy  should  be  the  last  to 
show  any  contempt  for  the  past.  We  claim 
communion  with  all  men  ;  shall  we  draw  the 
line    at    death  ?     We    appreciate  the  humorous 

c  17 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

aspect  of  the  self-contained  eighteenth-century 
individual,  "  author  of  himself  and  knowing  no 
other  kin  "  ;  shall  we  contemplate  a  self-con- 
tained and  isolated  age  that  refuses  affiliation  to 
other  ages  without  a  smile  ?  We  have  scant 
patience  with  the  pale  contemplative,  who  cuts 
himself  off  from  the  society  of  Tom,  Dick,  and 
Harry,  and  retires  into  a  select  brotherhood  ; 
but  why  are  we  so  tolerant,  of  the  robust  and 
healthy  present-day  citizen,  who  cultivates  the 
acquaintance  of  his  barber  and  his  billiard-marker, 
but  refuses  to  keep  company  with  Plato  or  St. 
Augustine  ?  A  democratic  instinct  which  em- 
braces only  its  contemporaries  is  a  strangely 
limited  and  exclusive  thing.  It  is  perfectly  true 
that  preoccupation  with  the  great  ones  of  the 
past  may  blind  us  to  the  existence  of  present 
greatness  walking  incognito  among  us  ;  but  it 
is  truer  still  that  a  wise  acquaintance  with  the 
past  will  make  us  less  likelyjto  allow  greatness 
to  pass  us  unnoticed,  for  it  will  teach  us  how  easy 
it  is  to  pass  Socrates  in  the  street  and  take  him 
for  a  bottle-washer,  and  how  often  we  have 
derided  our  dreamers  and  stoned  our  prophets. 

We  may  fairly  claim  for  this  age  of  ours  that 
it  has  freed  itself  from  all  superstitious  reverence 
for  tradition,  and  is  not  likely  to  relapse  into  the 
cramping  cult  of  antiquity.  All  the  more  should 
we  take  the  lessons  of  history  deeply  to  heart. 
The  sobriety  of  vision  which  enables  us  to  see 
the  mistakes  of  the  past  with  a  perhaps  unprece- 

*8 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

dented  clearness,  ought  surely  also  to  put  us 
into  an  unparalleled  position  for  appropriating 
its  most  precious  legacies.  What  will  it  avail 
that  we  view  the  past  to-day  unblinded  by  a 
superstitious  reverence,  if  the  same  penetration 
does  not  serve  us  to  elicit  its  hidden  significance 
as  the  uncritical  devotees  of  antiquity  could  not 
do  ?  We  think  we  are  entering  upon  a  great 
period  of  reconstruction.  If  that  is  so,  how  can 
we  justify  our  failure  to  avail  ourselves  of  the 
critical  and  path-breaking  work  of  past  ages, 
which  are  a  God-given  preparation  for  such  a 
period,  and  find  their  only  vindication  therein  ? 
If  we  resolved  to  devote  at  least  part  of  the  time 
which  we  now  give  to  the  often  futile  discussion 
of  purely  ephemeral  problems  to  the  patient 
study  of  some  great  historic  movement  or  system 
of  thought  germane  to  present  difficulties,  we 
would  gain  a  depth  of  insight  and  a  capacity  for 
the  effective  handling  of  current  questions  that 
would  astonish  us.  We  need  hardly  repeat  that 
such  study  cannot  take  the  place  of  that  direct, 
experimental  approach  to  our  problems  from 
which  nothing  can  absolve  us  ;  but  it  ought  to 
take  the  place  of  a  good  deal  of  disputation 
about  these  problems,  which  at  best  is  but  "the 
honourable  trifling  of  the  conquered/ ' 

Moreover,  the  past  is  not  something  external 
to  us,  which  we  may  ignore  if  we  please  ;  it  is 
woven 'into  the  texture  of  our  own  thought  and 
life.     Its  mistakes,  which  we  see  so  clearly  to- 

*9 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

day,  have  determined  our  own  bent  to  an  extent 
we  can  hardly  estimate  ;  its  fallacies  and  super- 
stitions have  more  foothold  in  us  than  we  know, 
their  expression  in  us  differing  too  widely  from 
their  original  form  -  to  be  readily  recognised.  Its 
achievements  and  discoveries  have  entered  into 
our  blood,  giving  us  that  grasp  and  sagacity, 
that  insight  and  perception,  which  we  so  seldom 
trace  to  their  true  source.  Like  Moliere's  peasant, 
who  talked  prose  without  knowing  it,  we  con- 
stantly reproduce — and  often  in  tragic  manner — 
the  very  past  we  so  glibly  criticise.  We  speak 
of  Bergson  with  an  Aristotelian  or  Platonic 
accent,  as  the  case  might  be.  We  discuss  Grace 
under  the  tyrannous  shadow  of  Augustine,  and 
where  we  violently  repudiate  the  term  and  sub- 
stitute for  it  the  Indwelling  of  God,  we  still  remain 
under  the  spell  of  the  ancients  ;  for  we  seldom 
use  the  words  without  falling  into  the  old  Greek 
vice  of  failing  to  distinguish  between  metaphor 
and  reality,  illustration  and  argument,  being 
deceived  by  spatial  and  physical  analogies.  It  is 
not  a  question  of  whether  we  shall  be  influenced 
by  the  past  or  not.  We  are  influenced  by  it  in 
the  most  intimate  and  inescapable  way.  What 
remains  to  be  settled  is  whether  we  shall  allow 
ourselves  to  be  blindly  or  intelligently  influenced  : 
whether  we  prefer  the  dead  hand  of  the  past 
to  gird  and  lead  us  unbeknown  to  ourselves,  or 
whether  we  choose  to  lay  the  living  hand  of 
the  present  upon  the  past  in  appropriation  and  dis- 

30 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

crimination.  These  questions  surely  admit  of 
only  one  answer.  We  cannot  escape  from  the 
past,  and  the  only  way  of  ceasing  to  be  its  blind, 
unconscious  slaves  and  becoming  its  free,  intelligent 
heirs  is,  first  of  all,  to  study  it,  not  necessarily 
with  the  minuteness  of  the  historical  expert — a 
process  which,  needless  to  say,  is  open  only  to  the 
very  few — but  with  the  teachable  mind  of  those 
who  would  discern  the  way  of  God  in  the  broad 
movements  of  the  Church's  history. 

A  great  discovery  awaits  such  students,  for 
it  is  one  of  the  functions  of  the  past  to  reveal 
Him  in  whom  all  the  ages  live.  If  the  history 
of  the  Apostolic  Church  reveals  His  educative 
and  inspiring  touch,  can  we  deny  it  of  any  later 
period,  or  of  the  history  of  religious  thought 
outside  the  Church  altogether  ?  The  truths  of 
history  are  not  "  accidental ";  they  have  a  spiritual 
authority,  a  timelessness,  a  particularity,  a  dy- 
namic and  creative  power  that  belong  to  life. 
They  are  not  alien  to  us.  In  them  Jesus  appears 
in  "  yet  another  form,"  and  our  most  intimate 
experiences  are  confirmed,  interpreted  and  en- 
larged by  contact  with  them.  We  hear  His 
voice  saying,  "Have  I  been  so  long  time  with 
you,  and  yet  hast  thou  not  known  Me  ?"  And  our 
fragmentary  and  incoherent  experiences  are  unified 
by  being  related  to  the  larger  whole.  One  wonders 
how  much  of  our  slowness  to  discern  in  the  move- 
ments of  our  time  Him  who  leads  all  the  genera- 
tions on  is  due  to  our  failure  to  give  heed  to 

21 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

"  the  voice  behind."  To  confine  the  living  word 
of  Christ  for  the  hour  to  the  intuitions  of  that 
hour  is  as  narrowing  as  to  confine  it  within  the 
boards  of  the  Bible. 


IV 

We  are  all  agreed  that  the  times  call  for 
theological  reconstruction.  Of  theological  re- 
statement, i.e.  the  translation  of  traditional 
conceptions  into  modern  language,  we  have 
had  enough;  what  we  need  is  the  creation  of 
new  conceptions  corresponding  to  our  new  ex- 
perience of  God.  And  in  approaching  this  great 
task,  much  will  depend  upon  our  attitude  to 
the  past. 

There  are  two  classes  of  people,  other  than  the 
upholders  of  traditionalism,  who  invariably  oppose 
theological  reconstruction.  There  are  those  who 
make  war  upon  theology  in  the  name  of  religion, 
and  those  who  make  war  upon  what  they  call 
traditional  theology  in  the  name  of  theological 
freedom — by  which  is  generally  meant  the  right 
to  ignore  the  past.  The  first  tell  us  that  it  is 
not  theology  that  matters  but  the  soul's  vital 
communion  with  God,  and  that  theology,  so  far 
from  promoting  that  converse,  has  always  obscured 
and  hindered  it.  The  second  contend  that  what 
is  wanted  is  not  theological  ^-construction,  but 
construction  de  novo.    They  are  not  merely  im- 

22 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

patient  but  positively  intolerant  of  the  past  ; 
they  demand  that  the  theological  slate  be  wiped 
clean  before  they  consent  to  set  chalk  to  it. 

The  first  type  is  a  belated  sufferer  from  that 
vicious  opposition  between  religion  and  theology 
which  a  generation  ago  produced  some  of  the 
most  futile  discussions  upon  which  strong  men 
ever  wasted  brain  and  breath.  Theology,  while 
entirely  distinct  from  religious  experience,  is  in- 
separable from  it  ;  and  we  have  coupled  our 
need  for  a  new  vision  of  God  with  the  demand 
for  theological  reconstruction  because  there  can 
be  no  authentic  theological  reconstruction  except 
in  the  light  of  a  present  vision.  It  is  not  enough 
to  say  that  theology  is  the  description,  the  in- 
tellectual formulation  and  interpretation,  of 
religious  experience ;  *  it  is  itself  largely,  though 
not  entirely,  created  and  conditioned  by  that 
experience.  In  other  words,  every  authentic 
religious  experience  involves  a  living  theology, 
and  the  experience  of  each  successive  generation 
carries  within  itself  the  demand  for  theological 
reconstruction.'  If  it  is  true  that  experience  is 
the  vital  part  of  the  subject-matter  of  theology, 
it  is  also  true  that  theology  is  part  of  religious 
experience  ;  for  experience,  where  it  is  something 
more  than  a  mere  devotional  feeling  or  mystic 

*  To  say  that  "  theology  is  only  a  side-product  of  Chris- 
tianity "  (Charles  E.  Raven,  "What  think  Ye  of  Christ  ?  "  p.  51) 
is  beside  the  mark.  One  might  as  well  say  that  Newton's  dis- 
covery of  the  law  of  gravitation  is  a  by-product  of  the  apple 
as  it  falls  from  the  tree. 

23 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

mood,  includes  a  creative  demand  for  a  reasoned 
interpretation. 

Where,  on  the  other  hand,the  rights  of  theology 
are  fully  recognised,  but  it  is  insisted  that  each 
age  must  begin  its  theologising  entirely  de  novo, 
we  are  faced  with  a  depreciation  of  the  past 
which  rests  upon  a  misconception  of  its  signifi- 
cance for  the  present.  Such  a  demand  proceeds 
upon  the  assumption  that  a  theology  which 
takes  the  thought  of  past  ages  into  serious  account 
is  to  be  deprecated  as  "  traditional.' '  But  while 
a  servile  and  superstitious  attitude  to  the  past 
obviously  spells  traditionalism,  what  makes  a 
theology  traditional  is  not  docility  to  the  teaching 
of  the  past,  but  disregard  of  the  demands  of 
the  present.  The  function  of  theology  is  to 
interpret  the  facts  of  religious  experience  as 
they  present  themselves  to  its  own  age  ;  and  where 
it  ignores  these  facts,  or  tries  to  bring  them  under 
superseded  categories — i.e.  where  it  is  traditional 
— it  ipso  facto  ceases  to  be  theology  in  any  real 
sense,  and  becomes  part  of  that  dogmatic  in- 
heritance which  it  is  the  business  of  theology 
to  examine  and  interpret  in  the  light  of  the  present 
day.  Mobility  is  an  essential  of  all  living  theology. 
Theological  thought  will  change  from  age  to  age 
in  proportion  as  it  is  genuine ;  and  a  serious  and 
sympathetic  study  of  the  past,  so  far  from  arrest- 
ing the  development  of  theology,  is  precisely  the 
factor  which  will  guide  it  from  the  eddies  of  mere 
flux  and  change  into  the  broad  stream  of  progress. 

24 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

This  is  sufficiently  evident  on  the  surface. 
The  student,  for  instance,  whose  ignorance  of 
history  prevents  him  from  recognising  the  Gnostic 
touch  in  Mr.  H.  G.  Wells,  or  the  recrudescence 
of  mediaeval  Pantheism  in  a  type  of  theology 
still  called  "New"  in  some  quarters,  or  the 
Pelagianism  peculiar  to  some  novelists  in  treating 
of  sin  and  redemption,  or  the  Docetism  which 
ensnares  certain  modern  writers  who  imagine 
themselves  to  be  thinking  in  Johannine  categories, 
will  not  be  the  man  whose  estimate  of  present- 
day  theological  tendencies  will  be  of  much  account. 
No  one  really  knows  the  spirit  of  his  age  except 
in  so  far  as  he  can  trace  its  relation  to  the  spirit 
of  past  ages.  The  past  does  not  live  in  books 
merely.  It  follows  us,  and  often  it  is  its  least 
desirable  characteristics  that  have  a  disconcerting 
trick  of  survival  and  resurrection.  Hence  it 
comes  about  that  the  "New"  theologian,  who 
makes  a  virtue  of  starting  clear  of  the  traditional 
incubus,  generally  ends  in  producing  a  composite 
and  motley  system,  wondrously  patched  together 
out  of  fragments  of  old  and  superseded  theories 
— the  only  really  new  thing  about  it  being  the 
thread  of  temperament  and  of  present-day  mental 
emphasis  and  accent  which  keeps  the  patches 
together. 

But  the  study  of  the  past  has  a  deeper  refer- 
ence to  the  work  of  theological  reconstruction 
than  this  obvious  application  goes  to  show.  In 
our  haste  to  escape  from  the  bonds  of  ancient 

25 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  authoritative  tradition,  we  have  often  for- 
gotten that  the  present  has  its  traditions  also, 
and  that  their  hold  upon  us  is  as  paralysing  as, 
and  far  more  insidious  than,  any  shackles  forged 
by  the  past.  "  The  air  is  thick  with  bastard 
traditions,"  as  Dr.  Hort  reminds  us,  "  which 
carry  us  captive  unawares  while  we  seem  to 
ourselves  to  be  exercising  our  freedom  and  our 
instinct  for  truth.  The  traditions  of  the  hour 
or  the  age  are  as  indubitably  external  to  us,  and 
as  little  founded  of  necessity  on  freshly  perceived 
truth,  as  any  traditions  of  the  past.  The  danger 
of  them  lies  in  their  disguise.  The  single  nega- 
tive fact  that  they  make  war  on  some  confessed 
tradition  prevents  us  from  discovering  that  they 
too  draw  their  force  no  less  from  an  authority, 
until  it  is  too  late  and  we  have  lost  or  damaged 
that  power  of  independent  vision  which  is  but 
braced  and  harmonised  by  a  known  and  honoured 
tradition."*  Each  age  has  its  atmosphere — the 
medium,  at  once  revealing  and  deceptive,  through 
which  the  children  of  that  age  see  truth.  In 
proportion  as  the  age  is  a  rebel  against  its  pre- 
decessors, that  atmosphere  is  rendered  more 
stimulating  and  also  more  delusive;  for  while, 
on  the  one  hand,  it  gives  a  keen  edge  to  thought, 
yet,  on  the  other,  it  impairs  its  integrity.  We 
think  our  revolt  against  conventional  theology 
is  original  to  ourselves,  whereas  in  reality  it  is 
due     to     our    passive    and    almost    unconscious 

*  "  The  Way,  the  Truth,  the  Life,"  pp.  91-2. 
26 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

absorption  of  the  atmosphere  of  revolt.  We 
imagine  we  are  speaking  out  of  our  own  experi- 
ence, whereas  we  are  merely  voicing  our  more 
or  less  unreflective  participation  in  the  feeling 
of  our  age.  Its  prejudices  deflect  the  course  of 
our  experience,  preventing  us  from  making  a 
completely  honest  and  untrammelled  venture 
upon  the  spiritual  life.  Its  antipathies  preclude 
our  adequate  understanding  of  aspects  of  ex- 
perience, not  in  the  least  alien  to  us  by  nature, 
but  rendered  remote  by  the  atmosphere  of  an 
age  to  which  they  are  alien.  At  every  step  we 
have  to  question  and  sift  our  own  impressions, 
asking  how  much  of  them  is  due  to  the  impact 
of  reality  upon  us,  and  how  much  to  prepossessions 
derived  from  the  age  we  live  in.  And  never  need 
we  interrogate  our  experience  more  searchingly 
than  when  we  are  conscious  of  entire  freedom. 
Our  search  is  not  for  a  pleasant  or  plausible 
theory  of  certain  appearances — for  a  comforting 
and  medicinal  explanation  of  what  goes  on  in 
our  souls — but  for  truth  ;  and  truth  is  always 
compelling.  It  does  not  offer  itself  to  our  free 
and  easy  choice:  it  is  "  never  that  which  we 
choose  to  believe,  but  always  that  which  we  are 
under  a  necessity  to  believe.' '  * 

It  is  from  the  entanglement  and  confusion  of 
our  delusive  contemporary  atmosphere,  with  its 
fatal  effect  upon  our  power  of  discerning  truth, 
that  a  right  study  of  the  past  will  deliver  us. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  93. 
27 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

In  its  mirror  bastard  traditions  are  readily  dis- 
cerned, old  things  masquerading  as  new  are  seen 
stripped  of  their  modern  trappings,  and,  what 
is  most  important  of  all,  that  which  is  really 
new — the  genuine  and  authentic  contribution  of 
our  age  to  religious  thought— is  liberated  from 
obscuring  factors  and  shown  in  its  true  bearings 
and  potencies.  Under  the  disciplinary  pressure 
of  trie  great  thoughts  of  the  past,  our  own  char- 
acteristic insight  into  truth  disentangles  itself 
from  its  occasional  and  ephemeral  setting  and 
fructifies  apace.  For  the  insight  of  the  moment 
can  only  fructify  as  it  is  related  to  the  whole 
coherent  field  of  thought  throughout  the  ages, 
and  the  unhistoric  mind  is  always  the  limited, 
the  uncatholic,  mind,  no  matter  though  it  speak 
the  language  of  advanced  liberalism.  If  we  take 
the  thought  of  one  age  only  for  our  province,  we 
must  not  expect  to  be  anything  but  provincial 
in  our  thinking.  Nor  will  it  mend  matters  if 
we  study  the  past  merely  in  order  to  discover 
how  much  of  its  thought  we  may  conscientiously 
cast  on  the  scrap-heap,  and  not  rather  in  order 
to  elicit  its  meaning  and  significance  for  to-day. 
The  right  study  of  the  past  involves  an  unfailing 
patience,  a  scrupulous  candour ;  above  all,  a 
profound  humility  that  belongs  to  ripe  spiritual 
culture.  It  is  not  easy,  but  it  is  worth  while — 
supremely  worth  while  for  those  who  are  not 
professional  theologians,  but  who  as  preachers 
and  teachers  are  in  peculiar  peril  of  allowing  a 

28 


Detachment  from  the  Past 

barren  revolt  against  fallen  theological  idols  to 
absolve  them  from  the  task  of  patient  recon- 
struction, and  are  ever  tempted  by  popular 
demands  to  put  a  superficial  effectiveness  in  the 
place  of  vital  truth.  On  the  lower  level,  the 
cultivation  of  the  historian's  temper  will  save 
us  again  and  again  from  the  controversial 
infirmity  known  as  "  whipping  a  dead  cat"  ;  on 
the  higher,  it  will  help  to  shape  in  us  that  power 
of  apprehending  truth  which  is  a  fundamental 
condition  of  spiritual  leadership. 


29 


CHAPTER    II 

THE    SNARE   OF   PESSIMISM 
I 

A  tendency  to  pessimism  is  the  haunting  beset- 
ment  of  thoughtful  minds.  It  is  the  creeping 
paralysis  of  the  Church,  and  her  imminent 
peril  in  a  day  such  as  this.  One  is  aware,  of 
course,  that  optimism  rather  than  pessimism  is 
the  rule  in  some  quarters  to-day.  The  selfless 
heroism  of  our  soldiers  and  sailors,  the  spirit  of 
comradeship  and  sacrifice  which  has  invaded  all 
classes  of  society,  and  the  note  of  spiritual  wist- 
fulness  often  found  in  the  least  likely  places 
are  construed  by  some  as  nothing  less  than 
the  conversion  of  the  Empire  to  the  spirit  of 
Christ.  But  on  the  whole  an  atmosphere  of 
gloom  prevails  among  thoughtful  Christian  people. 
The  apocalypse  of  greed,  treachery  and  cruelty 
which  Germany  has  shown  to  the  world,  and 
the  growing  disregard  of  moral  laws  and  sanctions 
among  our  own  people,  combine  to  alarm  us. 
We  are  confronted  with  a  world  largely  fallen  from 
standards  of  scrupulous  honesty  and  stainless 
honour  ;  a  world  in  which  reverence,  sensitiveness, 
and  true  chivalry  are  rare  even  among  the  educated 

3* 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

classes — indeed,  one  is  sometimes  tempted  to 
say,  rarer  among  the  educated  classes  than 
among  simple  folk.  Once  more  we  believe 
in  evil,  in  sin.  We  have  seen  the  devil,  and 
our  eyes  are  darkened.  We  do  not  deny  the 
splendid  revelations  of  undreamed-of  potencies 
for  good  which  the  war  has  brought  us  ;  but  they 
seem  brief  meteoric  flashes  beside  the  solid  lump 
of  apathy,  selfishness  and  dishonesty  that  obtrudes 
at  every  turn  in  the  level  walks  of  everyday  life. 

That  it  is  growing  increasingly  hard  to  get 
the  people  inside  the  Churches,  need  not  unduly 
alarm  us  in  itself  ;  but  taken  in  conjunction 
with  the  fact  that  every  educational  and  ethical 
movement  which  does  not  appeal  more  or  less 
directly  to  self-interest  or  to  the  commercial 
instincts  has  an  equally  decreasing  hold  upon 
our  people,  it  becomes  gravely  symptomatic. 
The  scope  of  education  is  tending  to  be  more 
and  more  narrowed  by  technical  aims,  and  dis- 
interested, non-academic  courses  of  study,  such 
as  those  held  under  the  auspices  of  the  University 
Extension  Movement,  or  the  Home  Reading 
Union,  make  a  very  slight  appeal. 

One  holds  no  brief  for  Victorian  amateur 
aestheticism  and  literary  posing.  It  is  quite 
true  that  much  of  the  old  interest  in  art  and 
literature  was  artificial,  and  that  its  decline  is 
partly  due  to  a  reaction  in  favour  of  reality. 
The  young  lady  of  leisure  who  could  not  under- 
stand how  anyone  could  live  without  belonging 

31 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

to  a  Browning  society  and  joining  a  Pre-Raphaelite 
circle  is  not  greatly  to  be  regretted.  But  while, 
in  many  sections  of  society,  these  studies  were 
no  more  than  a  fashionable  cult  and  an  irritating 
pose,  there  were  thousands  upon  thousands  of 
sincere,  unpretentious  people  who  pursued  them 
in  an  attitude  of  pure  disinterestedness  and  from 
a  genuinely  spiritual  impulse.  That  such  an 
impulse  is  even  half  as  common  to-day,  few  would 
care  to  assert.  Say,  if  you  will,  that  the  old 
literary  and  humanitarian  ideals  have  crumbled  at 
the  touch  of  reality.  That  may  be  entirely  true  ; 
but  it  does  not  touch  our  contention  that  we  lack 
the  disinterestedness  and  the  spiritual  impulse  to 
create  new  ideals  more  in  consonance  with  reality. 
And  if  indeed  the  revival  of  the  corporate  con- 
sciousness is  creating  a  new  altruism,  this  does  not 
make  up  for  the  lack  of  the  spiritual  motive  power 
which  alone  can  direct  it  into  fruitful  paths. 

Now  all  this  is  not  pessimism;  it  is  merely 
looking  facts  in  the  face.  Pessimism  supervenes 
when  we  construe  these  facts  as  a  fresh  demon- 
stration of  the  utter  bankruptcy  of  human  nature. 
And  it  need  not  surprise  us  to  find  pessimism 
once  more  in  the  ascendant  to-day.  A  pessimistic 
outlook  is  bound  to  be  the  besetting  temptation 
of  all  who  have  sufficient  clarity  of  vision  to  see 
the  facile  optimism  of  five  years  ago  as  it  appears 
in  the  grim,  remorseless  light  which  the  war  has 
shed  upon  the  roseate  view  of  life  that  preceded 
it.     One    need    only    open    pre-war    volumes    of 

32 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

theological  and  philosophical  Reviews  in  order  to 
realise  to  how  large  an  extent  even  the  most 
thoughtful  lived  in  a  fool's  paradise,  and  how 
inevitable  therefore  the  present  reaction  is.  Tak- 
ing an  instance  at  random,  we  find  an  accomplished 
writer  in  an  American  periodical  making  severe 
strictures  upon  the  Christian  askesis  which  bids 
us  destroy  the  offending  member  rather  than 
fail  of  the  true  life  : — 

To  be  sure,  if  one  is  so  badly  born  as  that,  he  has 
no  other  resource.  But  normal,  ordinary  people  have 
no  such  difficulties  with  their  eyes  or  other  members  as 
this.  .  .  .  Paul,  struggling  and  praying  to  be 
delivered  from  his  "  body  of  death,"  is  exceptional.  He 
is  not  a  type.  We  may  praise  him,  but  we  are  misled  by 
him  if  we  fall  into  his  way  of  thinking  of  the  good  life 
as  a  fight.  The  Platonic  conception  of  our  moral  task 
as  consisting  essentially,  not  in  an  internecine  civil  war 
in  our  members,  but  in  an  intelligent  organisation  of  the 
many  elements  of  our  richly  endowed  nature,  is  much 
more  rational  and  wholesome.  Ideal  goodness  is  simply 
the  amplest  expression  of  human  nature.  .  .  .  And 
the  Platonic  view  is  not  only  truer  to  the  experience  of 
twentieth-century  Americans  than  the  militant  and 
ascetic  view  with  which  we  are  so  familiar,  but  it  is  more 
in  accord  with  the  general  conception  we  are  coming  to 
have  of  civilisation.  The  old  times,  when  men  had  to 
fight  for  their  lives  against  savage  beasts,  and  still  mors 
savage  men,  are  passing.  More  and  more  the  life  of 
civilised  men  is  actually  becoming  a  vast  co-operative, 
constructive  activity.  * 

*  Dr.  G.  R.  Dodson,  in  the  Harvard  Theological  Review, 
January,  191 3. 

D  33 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Such  a  passage  as  this  may  be  viewed  in  two 
different  ways  by  the  present-day  pessimist, 
according  as  his  view  of  the  situation  is  shallower 
or  deeper.  He  may  tell  us  that  it  proves  how 
sadly  we  have  degenerated  from  our  pre-war 
idealism,  since  no  writer  in  his  senses  would 
describe  civilised  life  in  such  terms  to-day.  Or 
he  may  argue — and  with  far  more  justification — 
that  the  war  has  revealed  how  false  such  optimistic 
judgments  were  at  any  time.  The  good  life  is 
a  fight.  Men  always  carry  the  enemy  within 
themselves.  War  at  its  worst  may  be  a  more 
hopeful  thing  than  the  bland,  cultured,  unscru- 
pulous fight  for  wealth  that  marked  American 
life  in  days  of  peace,  concealing  the  passions  of 
sheer  savagery  behind  a  cold  and  calculating 
exterior.  Human  nature  has  always  been  a 
tragic  quantity — its  fitful  and  obscure  impulse 
towards  good  overridden  by  an  innate  bias 
towards  evil,  its  high  resolves  betrayed  by  weak- 
ness where  they  were  not  beaten  to  earth  by 
base  lusts,  its  achievements  ambiguous,  its 
progress  illusory.  War  has  not  brought  a  sudden 
accretion  of  evil ;  it  has  merely  unveiled  the  evil 
that  lay  latent  through  long  years  of  ease  and 
opulence,  overlaid  by  social  amenities  and  by 
those  traditions  of  decency  which  have  always 
gone  to  veil  the  ugly  things  of  life  from  our  pur- 
blind eyes. 

That  this  second  view  is  the  truer  and  deeper, 
few  would  care  to  question.     Long  years  of  ease 

34 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

and  opulence  have  indeed  blinded  our  eyes  to 
the  facts.  While  the  blatant  luxury,  the  un- 
scrupulous mammonism,  and  the  naked  mate- 
rialism of  the  age  before  the  war  did  not  escape 
our  judgment,  we  were,  on  the  whole,  lamentably 
insensitive  to  the  smug  and  demure  selfishness, 
the  polite  refusal  of  every  heroic  demand,  the 
unformulated  and  often  unconscious  materialism 
which  underlay  the  smooth,  unostentatious,  strictly 
respectable  lives  of  middle-class  folk,  who  held 
the  luxuries  and  vices  of  the  class  above  them 
in  righteous  abhorrence.  Nor  did  we  fathom  the 
paganism  which  animated  our  social  and  industrial 
system — a  paganism  with  every  hideous  possibility 
both  of  cynicism  and  savagery.  Small  wonder 
that  our  sudden  discovery  that  the  devil  was  not 
dead  delivered  us  over  to  pessimism !  Yet  pessi- 
mism is  always  an  enemy  more  to  be  feared  than 
the  most  puerile  of  roseate  delusions.  From  a 
groundless  optimism  there  is  a  straight  though 
hard  road  through  disillusionment  to  sober  think- 
ing ;  but  there  is  no  such  straight  road  back 
from  pessimism  to  sanity.  Optimism,  however 
little  foothold  it  may  have  in  present  actuality, 
always  has  some  hold  upon  reality.  It  anticipates 
things  to  come  ;  it  always  looks  upon  truth, 
though  it  be  obliquely  and  through  a  deceptive 
medium.  But  to  surrender  to  pessimism  means 
never  to  see  the  face  of  truth  again  until  the  soul 
is  cured  of  its  distemper.  The  pessimist  cannot 
see  things  as  they  are,  for  he  has^put  the  light  out. 

35 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

And  pessimism  is  never  so  dangerous  as  when 
it  seeks  an  escape  from  its  own  conclusions.  As 
long  as  it  contents  itself  with  the  investigation 
of  problems  and  conditions,  it  exercises  a  salutary 
corrective  function,  and  we  could  ill  spare  the 
illuminating  force  of  its  ruthless  and  sombre 
diagnosis.  It  is  when  pessimism  forgets  its  own 
creed  and  applies  itself  to  therapeutics  that  we 
have  cause  to  fear  ;  for  nowhere  is  it  truer  that 
the  cure  may  be  worse  than  the  disease. 


II 

The  pessimism  of  religious  people  has  always 
been  of  a  twofold  nature,  and  given  birth  to  one 
or  other  of  two  distinct  theories  of  the  Church, 
or  the  Christian  Society.  There  has  always  been 
a  pessimism  concerning  the  state  of  the  world 
which,  in  the  case  of  Christian  souls,  often  led 
to  a  revived  hope  in  the  Church,  and  a  pessimism 
regarding  the  state  of  the  Church  which  often 
looked  hopefully  to  the  world  as  the  theatre  of 
the  Spirit's  operations.  (Of  the  deeper  pessimism, 
which  includes  both  Church  and  world  in  its 
condemnation,  it  is  not  necessary  to  speak  here.) 
The  first  of  these  two  types  of  pessimism  has 
given  rise  to  two  distinct  attitudes,  both  of  which 
are  with  us  to-day. 

On  the  one  hand,  earnest  minds  are  craving 
for  a  spiritual  society  whose  strength  shall  be, 

3c 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

not  in  its  numbers,  but  in  the  purity,  sincerity, 
and  whole-hearted  consecration  of  its  member- 
ship ;  whose  weapons  of  warfare  shall  not  be 
the  carnal  ones  of  external  organisation  and 
statecraft,  but  the  armoury  of  the  Spirit ; — a 
Church,  in  short,  of  the  primitive  and  Apostolic 
type,  owing  nothing  to  worldly  prestige  and 
influence,  and  disdaining  all  adventitious  aids 
to  impressiveness.  Based  upon  regenerated  per- 
sonality, such  a  Church  would  never  seek  to 
attract  the  curious  public,  or  sacrifice  the  sanctity 
and  freedom  of  the  individual  to  institutional 
ends.  Its  only  machinery  would  be  the  quiet 
word  of  witness,  the  systematic  teaching  of 
truth,  and  the  unostentatious  social  service  that 
needs  no  advertising  or  spectacular  propaganda  ; 
its  only  mission  to  bear  witness  to  the  things  of 
the  Spirit,  that  it  might  call  out  from  the  world 
those  in  whose  hearts  the  same  Spirit  had  already 
spoken  His  impelling  word.  Such  a  Church 
would  remain  numerically  small,  attracting  only 
an  elect  minority — the  few  "  chosen' '  among  the 
many    "  called." 

This  ideal  is  far  more  common  to-day  than 
is  generally  suppos&L  Many  earnest  spirits  out- 
side the  pale  of  organised  Christianity  secretly 
cherish  the  dream  of  a  pure  and  holy  Family 
of  God,  of  which  the  actual  seems  an  intolerable 
travesty.  And  within  the  Church  also  the  demand 
for  a  true  Body  of  Christ,  separated  from  the 
world— nay,   uncompromisingly  opposed  to   it — 

37 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

is  once  more  becoming  articulate.  Her  best 
sons  recognise  that  her  weakness  is  due  to  her 
increasing  worldliness  of  temper  and  outlook,  to 
her  dishonouring  alliances  with  the  very  powers 
she  is  pledged  to  combat.  They  see  her  bartering 
her  birthright  of  spiritual  triumph  for  the  empty 
promise  of  a  spectacular  success,  losing  her  soul 
and  not  even  gaining  the  world  in  exchange.  And 
the  remedy  suggested  is  a  stern  pruning  of  her 
membership,  and  a  return  to  the  intransigent 
attitude  which  characterised  her  in  her  earliest 
days. 

That  remedy  is  a  counsel  of  despair,  and  has 
proved  itself  to  be  that  throughout  the  Church's 
history.  Churches  and  sects  that  have  restricted 
their  membership  to  those  who  profess  to  have 
passed  through  a  certain  religious  experience, 
segregating  themselves  from  the  intellectual  and 
social  currents  of  their  age,  and  regarding  the 
masses  outside  their  membership  as  separated 
from  them  by  a  gulf  which  only  a  cataclysmic  act 
of  God  can  bridge,  have  failed  even  to  realise 
the  limited  ideal  of  a  saintly  community.  They 
have  invariably  and  inevitably  opened  a  wide 
door  to  hypocrisy  and  sel£deception,  marred 
genuine  saintliness  by  a  censorious,  grudging 
spirit,  and  incurred  the  final  fate  of  all  societies 
founded  on  pessimism,  a  jaundiced  view  of  what 
is  undoubtedly  one  aspect  of  the  truth  betraying 
them  into  disintegrating  fanaticisms  and  puer- 
ilities.    They    have    always    attracted    the    very 

38 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

people  they  were  designed  to  exclude — the  false 
"  professors/'    whom   they   rightly   judge   to   be 
more    dangerous    than    worldlings — and   died   of 
internal  dissolution.   No  such  Church  can  stand 
in  the  long  run,  because  it  is  founded  upon  a 
perversion.     The    contention    of    religious    pessi- 
mism that  the  world  is  given  over  to  evil,  that 
the  Church   is  the  only  ark  of  refuge,  and  that 
Church  and  world  have  as  little  in  common  as 
Christ  and  Belial,  has  no  foundation  in  reality. 
There  is  a  world-principle,  a  worldly  spirit  and 
temper,  a  carnal  mind,  and  a  "body  of  death" 
against  which  the  Church  is  sent  to  wage  unceasing 
warfare — such  is  the  familiar  truth  of  which  the 
theory  of    an  intransigent   Church  is  the  pessi- 
mistic  perversion.     But    there    is    also    a    world 
which  God  loves,  a  world  in  which  His  Spirit  is 
working  in  ways  too  manifold  and  subtle  to  be 
distinguished  by  the  impatient  eye  of  the  cen- 
sorious   sectarian ;     and   since    that    is    so,    the 
Church     cannot    afford    to     be  on    intransigent 
terms  with  it.     She  cannot  ignore  or  despise  it 
without    disloyalty    to    her    Lord ;     she    cannot 
withdraw  herself  from  its  intellectual  and  social 
struggles    without    calling    that    common    which 
God    has    cleansed.     She    cannot    disclaim    her 
responsibility  for  those  without  her  pale — a  re- 
sponsibility   resting,    not    upon    her    superiority 
to  them,  but  upon  her  kinship  with  them — without 
doing  despite  to  the  image  of  God  in  man.     To 
her  witness,  the  witness  of  the  Spirit  in  the  world 

39 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

is  a  necessary  complement  and  answer.  While 
speaking  with  an  authority  derived  from  her 
Lord  Himself,  she  must  also  listen  to  that  same 
Lord  as  He  speaks  with  many  voices  in  the 
world  to  which  she  brings  His  most  effectual 
Word.  To  take  these  voices  humbly  and  rever- 
ently into  account  is  but  to  acknowledge  that 
Christ  always  goes  in  advance  of  His  heralds  ; 
it  is  but  to  recognise  the  prepared  soil  that  the 
seed  may  be  the  more  effectual. 

The  thought  of  a  pure  and  stainless  Church, 
holy,  harmless,  and  undefiled  in  the  midst  of  a 
wicked  and  perverse  generation,  will  never  lose 
its  hold  upon  aspiring  souls,  for  it  is  entirely 
valid  ;  but  its  translation  into  terms  of  an  ex- 
clusive sect  is  doomed  to  failure.  Pessimism 
here  is  a  fatal  insensitiveness  to  the  hidden  hand 
of  Christ  in  the  world.  Wherever  the  working 
of  that  Hand  is  ignored  or  denied  in  the  alleged 
interests  of  a  pure  Church,  there  the  Gospel  is 
obscured  and  the  Holy  One  of  Israel  limited. 
Such  a  Church  carries  the  seeds  of  death  within 
itself.  For,  in  the  last  resort,  a  Church  lives 
by  its  message — using  that  term,  not  in  the 
narrow  sense  of  a  verbal  proclamation  merely, 
but  including  in  it  the  total  witness  of  its  life 
and  work — and  the  message  of  an  intransigent 
Church  is  a  fugitive,  cloistered,  anaemic  thing. 
Like  Bel  and  Nebo  of  old,  its  religion  has  to 
be  laboriously  carried,  instead  of  endowing  the 
soul  with  wings  ;    shielded,  where  it  should  be 

40 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

an  impregnable  armour.  It  reminds  us  of  certain 
pictures  of  the  Flight  into  Egypt,  dear  to  our 
early  days.  They  show  the  grim,  perilous  wilder- 
ness, with  a  bird  of  prey  hovering  like  a  spot  of 
gold  in  the  merciless  blue,  and  across  it,  hurrying 
as  fast  as  their  burden  would  let  them,  Mary 
and  Joseph  with  the  Child.  Mary's  mother- 
agony  is  in  her  eyes  ;  the  strain  of  bitter  anxiety 
furrows  the  brow  of  Joseph.  The  next  picture 
shows  them  entering  a  city.  Passers-by  stop 
to  look  at  the  sleeping  Boy,  and  the  Mother's 
eyes  reflect  a  spasm  of  apprehension.  She  hugs 
the  Child  close  with  an  almost  desperate  grip. 
The  sword  has  entered  her  heart.  In  the  streets 
of  Heliopolis  she  sees — a  Cross.  Which  things 
are  a  parable  of  every  Church  that  takes  a  pessi- 
mistic view  of  its  mission.  To  surround  our 
faith,  our  creed,  our  life  with  a  becalmed  and 
relaxing  atmosphere  of  seclusion  and  timidity 
is  to  deplete  salt  of  its  savour  and  light  of  its 
illuminating  power,  to  withhold  seed  from  the 
soil  and  leaven  from  the  lump.  The  religion 
of  Jesus  Christ  is  not  made  for  seminaries  and 
spiritual  coteries ;  its  field  is  the  world,  and 
to  narrow  that  field  by  one  furrow  is  to  rob  our 
Lord.  It  is  meant  to  take  its  chance  against 
hostile  forces  as  the  sunlight  against  disease. 
It  is  equally  at  home  in  the  gaiety  of  a  village 
wedding  and  in  the  rough-and-tumble  of  the 
market-place.  It  is  not  afraid  of  discussion, 
asks  and  answers  questions,  and  finds  its  most 

41 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

congenial  sphere  wherever  men  burst  the  shackles 
of  religious  and  social  conventions  and  take  big 
risks.  The  Church  that  tries  to  confine  it  within 
the  valetudinarian  circle  of  its  elect,  and  to 
force  it  into  the  mould  of  a  narrow  and  Pharisaical 
conception  of  life,  will  always  find  itself  in  the 
end  hugging  an  empty  shell. 


Ill 

In  contrast  to  this  conception,  yet  akin  to  it 
because  springing  from  the  same  root,  is  what 
may  be  called  the  Roman  ideal  of  the  Church — 
an  ideal  which  has  a  perennial  attraction  for 
weary  and  disillusionised  spirits,  and  never  more 
so  than  in  times  of  change  and  upheaval.  It 
offers  a  Church,  separate  indeed  from  the  world, 
and  very  proudly  and  irreconcilably  separate, 
but  by  no  means  content  to  be  "  lightly  by  the 
world  esteemed."  On  the  contrary,  its  aim  is 
to  set  over  against  the  State  an  organisation  even 
more  massive  and  compelling,  to  stir  the  public 
imagination  where  it  cannot  rule  the  public 
conscience,  and  to  impress  those  whom  it  fails 
to  convince.  In  its  extreme  Ultramontane  form, 
it  lives  by  domination  and  coercion.  Claiming 
to  be  conterminous  with  the  Kingdom  of  God, 
it  counts  the  whole  realm  of  intellectual  achieve- 
ment its  own,  seeks  to  impose  its  laws  upon  the 
nations,   and  to   shape   secular   policy   and  use 

42 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

secular  power  for  its  own  ends.  It  constitutes 
itself  the  final  court  of  appeal  for  the  State  as 
well  as  the  soul,  controls  education,  creates  and 
directs  public  opinion,  sets  its  mark  of  owner- 
ship upon  every  movement  that  can  in  any  way 
further  its  ends,  and  directs  the  weapons  of 
popular  prejudice  and  superstition  against  any 
movement  that  seeks  other  ends,  using  men  and 
nations  alike  as  pawns  in  its  great  game.  It 
is  an  imposing  conception,  whose  fascination 
will  not  wane  so  long  as  men  grow  impatient 
with  the  amazing  slowness  and  gentleness  of 
God,  and  look  for  a  Kingdom  "  made  with  hands." 
It  is  not  confined  to  Rome,  but  operates  wherever 
a  Church,  whether  Established  or  Free,  puts  its 
trust  in  authority  and  organisation,  recognises 
no  interests  except  its  own,  relies  upon  a  spec- 
tacular programme,  and  prefers  outward  unity 
of  creed  and  action  to  the  free  Fellowship  of  the 
Redeemed.  Nor  is  it  the  unscrupulous  ambition 
and  un-Christlike  temper  of  many  of  its  leading 
representatives  that  constitute  the  danger  of 
such  an  ideal.  The  gentlest  and  most  reasonable 
application  of  its  principles  and  methods  cannot 
alter  its  fundamental  opposition  to  the  principles 
and  methods  of  Christ. 

And  while  it  is  the  ideal  of  a  conquering  Church, 
it  is  as  pessimistic  in  essence  as  the  ideal  of  a 
despised  society  of  saints.  It  was  indeed  cradled 
in  pessimism.  When,  in  a.d.  410,  the  gradual 
decline  of  the  Roman  Empire  culminated  in  the 

43 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

fall  of  Rome,  despair  seized  the  Church,  whose 
leaders  already  heard  the  marauding  feet  of  the 
Barbarians  approaching  the  Ark  of  God.  Twenty 
years  later,  Augustine  died  while  the  heathen 
hordes  were  clamouring  at  the  gates  of  Hippo. 
During  the  greater  part  of  these  twenty  years  he 
was  occupied  in  writing  his  famous  "  De  Civitate 
Dei " — on  the  surface  a  triumph  of  optimism,  in 
reality  a  classic  of  Christian  pessimism,  if  such 
a  contradiction  in  terms  be  permissible — speaking 
with  the  voice  at  once  of  a  prophet  and  of  a  con- 
structive statesman.  The  superficial  optimism 
of  the  book  is  obvious.  Unconquerable  must 
have  been  the  hope  of  a  man  who,  amid  the 
crash  and  ruin  of  the  civilisation  that  had  nurtured 
him,  could  pen  the  vision  of  a  City  of  God  planted 
four-square  upon  the  earth — a  heavenly  civitas 
set  up  in  the  midst  of  hostile  world-powers, 
limited  by  no  distinction  of  race,  nationality, 
or  culture,  comprising  the  dead  as  well  as  the 
living,  destined  to  triumph  over  the  civitas 
hominum.  In  the  midst  of  experiences  which 
might  well  distract  the  mind  and  sicken  the 
heart  of  the  strongest,  he  attempts  to  justify 
the  ways  of  God  to  man,  in  a  stupendous  treatise 
building  up  stone  by  stone  a  massive  philosophy 
of  history,  conceived  with  a  boldness,  breadth, 
and  exhaustless  energy  of  thought  that  leave 
one  breathless.  To  have  made  such  an  attempt 
at  such  a  period  of  the  Church's  history  must 
surely  augur  a  splendid  optimism. 

44 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

i  But  on  a  closer  view,  we  realise  that  it  was 
far  otherwise.     True,  the  great  classic  is  domin- 
ated by  a  deathless  hope  ;    but  it  is  the  hope  of 
the  apocalyptic  prophet.     "  De  Civitate  Dei"  is, 
at  bottom,  "  a  tract  for  bad  times  "—that  is,  a 
work  written,  not  that  the  bad  times  may  become 
better,  but  out  of  the  profound  conviction  that 
they  are  irredeemably  bad.     In  it  world-despair 
seeks   to   drown   itself   in   Church-consciousness. 
Its  City  of  God  is  not  the  inalienable  home  of 
mankind — its   home    still,    however   far    it    may 
have  strayed — but  an  ark  of  refuge  for  such  as 
have  received  the  sovereign  and  occult  grace  of 
God,  that  they  might  seek  salvation  within  its 
walls.     Nor  was  it  merely  world-despair ;  it  was 
no  less  a  despair  of  the  Church,  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment sense  of  the  term.     No  teacher  of  that  time 
had  a  clearer  vision  of  the  true  Church,  the  free 
and  holy  fellowship  of  believers  ;    but  in  trans- 
ferring its  prerogatives  to  the  externa  communa, 
he   virtually    surrendered   that   vision.     In   that 
transference  the  Roman  ideal  lies  involved,  how- 
ever sharply  many  of  its  features  may  conflict 
with    what    is    most     permanently    valuable    in 
Augustinianism.     For   both  proceed  on  the   as- 
sumption that  the  world  is  given  over  to  evil, 
and  that  a  Church  which  relies  solely  upon  spirit- 
ual means,  and  seeks  to  build  the  Kingdom  upon 
the  foundations  of  love,  freedom  and  knowledge, 
is  too  unaggressive  and  slow   to   cope   with  the 
quick,  tough  forces  that  are  arrayed  against  it. 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Like  its  antipode,  the  conception  of  a  small, 
elect  society,  the  Roman  ideal  involves  the  denial 
of  the  soul's  innate  and  indelible  affiliation  to 
God — the  Christ  within  every  man — and  of  the 
Spirit's  free  working  in  the  world.  And  the  only 
escape  from  pessimism,  the  only  reconciling 
principle  that  can  save  us  from  the  vicious  dilemma 
between  Church  and  world,  and  rescue  the  Church 
at  once  from  worldliness  and  from  intransigency, 
lies  in  the  realisation  of  the  Light  that  lighteth 
every  man,  the  Light  of  the  world  as  well  as  of 
the  Church.  The  "New  Theology"  has  brought 
the  doctrine  of  The  Christ  Within  into  discredit 
by  its  shallow  juggling  with  moral  values,  but 
that  fact  does  not  give  us  any  right  to  ignore 
it ;  and  we  do  this  now  already  defunct  move- 
ment far  too  much  honour  if  we  allow  it  to  drive 
us  into  the  opposite  extreme.  Christ  is  in  man. 
He  is  in  the  world.  Therefore  the  Church  cannot 
afford  to  preserve  an  attitude  of  spiritual  ex- 
clusiveness,  let  alone  of  spiritual  arrogance.  But 
if  Christ  is  in  the  human  soul  and  in  the  world's 
life,  He  is  there,  first  of  all,  as  He  that  convicts 
of  sin.  He  is  there  to  set  the  soul,  and  the  world, 
at  war  with  itself  ;  to  create  self-criticism  where 
complacency  has  reigned  ;  to  make  the  calm  of 
self-righteousness  into  a  tempest  of  remorse,  that 
the  flower  of  penitence  might  spring  from  the 
storm-cleft  soil ;  to  be  the  soul's  Accuser  as 
well  as  its  Hope ;  the  world's  tormenting  Con- 
science as  well  as  its  Inspiration*     Once  this  is 

46 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

grasped,  the  Church's  attitude  to  the  world 
becomes  clear.  By  acknowledging  the  presence 
and  influence  of  its  Lord  in  the  world,  the  Church 
will  look  upon  it,  not  as  a  hostile  country  to  be 
attacked  by  assault,  and  won  by  giving  no  quarter 
to  its  citizens,  but  as  a  field  white  unto  harvest — 
the  most  hopeful  thing  that  ever  gladdened  the 
eye  of  man.  By  allying  itself  with  its  Lord  as 
the  world's  Conscience  and  Judge,  its  optimism 
will  be  saved  from  shallowness  and  unreality. 
Its  faith  in  the  Christ  within  man  and  within 
the  world's  life,  so  far  from  making  it  tolerant 
of  the  world's  evil  and  low  standards,  will  inspire 
it  with  an  uncompromising  antagonism  to  worldly 
principles  and  methods. 


IV 

It  is  this  attitude  that  is  needed  to-day,  if 
we  are  not  to  be  betrayed  into  a  sterile  and 
disintegrating  pessimism.  With  our  sense  of  sin 
sharpened  by  the  terrible  events  of  our  time,  we 
are  sorely  tempted,  on  the  one  hand,  to  religious 
fanaticism,  and,  on  the  other,"  to  the  thought 
that  the  Church  has  failed  more  completely  and 
finally  than  a  world  which  is  already  showing  the 
stirrings  of  a  new  spirit.  We  have  among  us 
an  increasing  number  of  people  who  have  turned 
their  backs  upon  the  Church,  not  because 
of    religious    indifference,    still    less    of    positive 

,     47 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

hostility,  but  in  the  conviction  that  it  can  no 
longer  satisfy  the  highest  spiritual  cravings  of 
mankind.  Many  of  them  have  drifted  into  Theo- 
sophy,  New  Thought,  and  similar  cults;  and 
among  them  are  so  many  souls  of  genuine  spiritual 
quality  and  fine  capacity  that  it  is  worse  than 
futile  to  label  them  neurotics  and  cranks.  If  the 
Church  would  meet  the  needs  of  the  best  spirits 
among  them,  it  must  have  done  with  such  counsels 
of  despair  as  either  the  ideal  of  a  small  society 
of  elect  believers,  delimited  by  doctrinal  tests, 
or  by  conformity  to  a  stereotyped  form  of  spiritual 
experience,  or  the  Roman  translation  of  the 
world's  methods  into  the  language  of  Catholicism. 
Only  a  Church  that  at  once  regards  the  world  as 
the  theatre  of  the  Spirit's  operation  and  the  site 
of  God's  growing  Kingdom,  and  challenges  it  un- 
flinchingly in  the  name  of  that  Spirit  and  in  the 
interests  of  that  Kingdom,  can  bring  Christ  to 
men  to-day. 

To  such  a  Church,  organised  in  the  name  of 
Christ,  seeking,  not  to  impress  herself  upon  the 
world,  but  only  to  serve  the  ends  of  His  Kingdom 
and  to  build  that  Kingdom  with  the  material 
of  His  ordering,  the  test  of  numbers  will  not 
apply.  It  is  constituted  wherever  two  or  three 
are  gathered  in  Christ's  name.  It  is  not  exclusive. 
It  sets  up  no  external  tests,  whether  of  ecclesias- 
tical adherence,  which  would  make  it  schismatic ; 
or  of  assent  to  a  creed,  which  would  stamp  it  as 
sectarian  ;   or  of  outward  character,  which  would 

48 


The  Snare  of  Pessimism 

rank  it  with  the  Pharisees  and  Scribes  against 
its  Master.  And  though  it  remains  a  Church  of 
but  two  or  three,  it  is  still  the  Church  Catholic, 
the  Church  victorious.  For  it  embodies  a  principle 
of  universal  application  ;  it  carries  within  it  that 
which  will  yet  attract  to  itself  uncounted  multi- 
tudes of  the  faithful  and  true,  the  loyal  and  loving, 
until  the  knowledge  of  the  Lord  covers  the  earth 
as  the  waters  cover  the  sea. 


49 


PART  II 

THE  CHRISTIAN  MESSAGE  TO  THE 
NEW  AGE 


CHAPTER    III 

THE    CHURCH   AS   TEACHER 


The  sight  of  Britain  awake  after  long  years  of 
drugging  opulence,  with  the  dust  of  delusion 
shaken  from  her  eyes,  and  the  joy  of  sacrifice 
in  her  heart — of  England  awake  in  her  young 
men  and  women,  who  at  one  fiery  touch  have 
cast  selfish  ease  and  low  contentment  from  them 
as  worn-out  rags,  and  put  on  the  beautiful  gar- 
ments of  dedication — has  thrilled  our  hearts. 
The  enemy  little  thought  that  we  would  enter 
the  lists  against  perfidy  and  oppression.  He 
had  made  sure  that  we  feared  him  too  greatly 
to  run  the  risk,  and  were  too  sorely  torn  by  class 
and  party  strife  at  home,  and  too  weak  in  face 
of  rebellious  elements  within  the  Empire,  to  be 
able  to  present  a  united  and  unbroken  front. 
To-day  he  knows  better.  The  sense  of  a  great 
and  righteous  cause  overrode  at  one  sweep  all 
counsels  of  ignoble  prudence,  and  united  races, 
parties,  and  classes,  which  but  a  few  weeks  before 
had  seemed  irreconcilable,  into  one  great  brother- 
hood of  fighting  men.  We  may  say  what  we 
will,  and  much  needs  to  be  said,  about  the  seamy 

53 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

places  in  our  national  life  which  the  war  has 
revealed ;  one  thing  towers  above  all  these  un- 
veilings  of  evil — the  soul  of  Britain  reborn  and 
transfigured. 

And  as  we  ponder  this  glorious  mystery  of 
the  nation's  awaking  from  sleep,  we  are  tempted 
to  contrast  with  it  a  Church  still  too  complacent 
and  inert.  Against  the  regal  background  of  an 
Empire  vowed  to  the  uttermost  risk  and  sacrifice, 
she  appears  languid,  self-centered,  unmilitant. 
Instead  of  unity,  we  see  dismemberment  and 
petty  rivalry  ;  instead  of  brotherhood,  a  selfish 
individualism  ;  instead  of  a  great  fight,  an  ex- 
asperating preoccupation  with  small  and  theo- 
retical issues.  Has  the  Church  no  enemy  to 
fight,  we  are  tempted  to  ask,  that  she  can  afford 
to  let  ungenerous  competition  and  party  strife 
prevail  within  her  borders  ?  Has  she  no  great 
cause  to  stand  for,  no  dynamic  motive  to  unite 
her,  no  fiery  inspiration  to  goad  her  to  daring  ? 
Can  the  call  of  Empire  accomplish  what  the  call 
of  Christ  fails  to  do  ?  Are  the  enemies  of  the 
Empire  more  real  and  threatening  than  the 
Enemy  of  souls  ?  Does  the  blood  that  drenched 
the  fair  fields  of  France  speak  more  compelling 
things  than  the  Blood  shed  on  Calvary  ?  Since 
the  Church  has  failed  to  create  a  spirit  of  unity, 
brotherhood,  and  holy  militancy,  can  she  not, 
at  least,  submit  to  have  it  kindled  within  her  by 
the  example  of  the  Empire  ? 

That  there  is  justification  for  such  questions, 

54 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

no  one  would  care  to  deny ;  but  the  truth  they 
embody  does  not  go  deep  enough.  Unity,  brother- 
hood, and  militancy  are  certainly  needed  if  the 
Church  is  to  represent  Christ  in  the  new  age  ; 
but  they  are  not  her  primary  needs.  The  re- 
iterative insistence  with  which  preachers  and 
writers  have  dwelt  upon  her  lack  of  corporate 
life  and  of  the  warrior  spirit  has  set  sensitive 
souls  on  edge  with  a  poignant,  if  inarticulate, 
dissatisfaction  and  longing  ;  but  no  amount  of 
urging  can  avail  to  change  the  secondary 
character  of  things  that  are  secondary.  The 
fundamental  need  of  the  Church  is  something 
other  and  deeper  than  any  or  all  of  these  three 
things ;  and  until  we  recognise  the  primary, 
our  insistence  upon  the  secondary  will  remain 
little  more  than  a  blind  demand,  expressing  a 
genuine  need,  but  utterly  impotent  to  meet  it. 
It  is  our  insight  into  the  great  primal  needs  that 
alone  can  give  these  derivatives  their  vital  con- 
tent. The  Empire  was  not  welded  into  a  great, 
united  fighting  force  by  saying,  "  Our  supreme 
need  is  unity,  brotherhood,  and  militancy  ;  go 
to,  let  us  be  united  and  brotherly  and  militant.' ' 
What  united  us  was  the  clear  recognition  of  a 
common  foe  and — what  is  far  more  to  the  point 
— the  power  of  a  great  ideal.  It  is  not  so  much 
what  we  are  fighting  against  as  what  we  are 
fighting  for  that  nerves  Britain  with  a  moral  and 
spiritual  force  to  which  but  yesterday  she  seemed 
a  stranger.     It  is  the  vision  of  the  Britain  that 

55 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

is  to  be,  of  the  world  as  God  intended  it,  that 
unites  her  sons  to-day  in  bonds  purer  and  stronger 
far  than  any  which  the  mere  consciousness  of  a 
common  foe  can  forge.  Indeed,  if  we  rightly 
measure  the  malignity  of  the  foe,  it  is  only  in  the 
light  of  the  ideal  against  which  he  has  launched 
his  forces. 

And  this  is  even  more  true  of  the  Church. 
Unity,  corporateness,  and  the  passion  of  the 
happy  warrior  are  not  self-contained  entities 
that  can  be  aimed  at  for  their  own  sakes.  They 
are  of  value  precisely  in  proportion  to  the  value 
of  the  cause  or  impulse  which  created  them. 
Our  enemies  were  also  a  united  force ;  they  also 
were  resolved  to  fling  their  all  into  the  furnace, 
and  to  fight  to  the  death.  If  union,  comrade- 
ship, and  fighting  courage  were  to  be  coveted 
in  themselves,  apart  from  moral  values,  many 
an  association  of  crooks  and  criminals  could 
give  both  Church  and  Empire  "  points."  This 
is  sufficiently  obvious,  yet  it  needs  to  be  em- 
phasised at  a  time  when  these  qualities  are 
worshipped  with  so  blind  a  fervour,  and  when  an 
impatient  public  is  saying  to  the  Churches, 
"  Look  at  the  Empire  !  Why,  in  the  name  of 
religion,  can't  you  show  the  same  spirit  ?  " 

The  Churches,  always  too  easily  reduced  to 
an  apologetic  attitude  by  popular  criticism,  have 
taken  up  the  challenge,  and  are  initiating  a 
crusade  for  reunion,  the  revival  of  the  corporate 
life,  and  a  new  programme  of  spiritual  warfare. 

56 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

This  crusade  is  to-day  being  preached  from 
almost  every  influential  pulpit,  and  cannot  fail 
to  stir  the  hearer  who  has  the  cause  of  Christianity 
at  heart.  But  the  time  has  come  when  we  need 
to  ask  ourselves  certain  preliminary  questions. 
We  are  bidden  to  unite  ;  have  we  really  grasped 
that  which  we  are  to  unite  upon  ?  We  are  ex- 
horted to  brotherliness  ;  have  we  a  clear  con- 
ception of  the  basis  and  characteristic  quality 
of  Christian  brotherhood  ?  We  are  called  to 
enlist  in  a  holy  war;  do  we  really  know,  with 
a  vital  and  experimental  knowledge,  what  it  is 
that  we  are  to  fight  for  ?  These  are  the  merest 
commonplaces,  but  we  have  wandered  away  so 
far  from  the  region  of  reality  to  which  they 
belong  that  their  very  homeliness  seems  startling. 
We  have  for  so  long  been  urged  to  unite  and 
fight  against  this  and  that  enemy  that  we  have 
tended  to  live  upon  negatives,  and  forgotten 
that  what  is  of  primary  importance  is  not  our 
recognition  of  the  enemy,  but  the  vision  of  our 
Captain.  We  are  constantly  being  told  that 
the  Church  is  too  indifferent  to  moral  perils,  and 
too  little  indignant  against  moral  evil.  But 
what  the  Church  has  first  and  foremost  to  be 
alarmed  about  is  not  the  outbreaks  of  evil  that 
shock  society  every  now  and  then,  but  her  own 
slender  grasp  upon  the  sources  of  moral  renewal, 
her  attenuated  understanding  of  the  Gospel  com- 
mitted to  her,  and  the  poverty  of  her  experience 
of  Christ. 

57 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 


II 

It  comes  to  this — that  the  first  concern  of  the 
Church  at  any  and  every  time  must  be  her 
message.  She  is  not  here  primarily  to  fight 
against  opposing  forces,  whether  by  way  of 
defensive  or  by  way  of  offensive,  but  to  build 
a  Kingdom.  She  is,  so  to  speak,  a  great  colon- 
ising power.  Whatever  warfare  she  may  have 
to  wage — and  the  true  Church  is  always,  to  some 
extent,  a  fighting  Church — is  only  incidental  to 
her  great  constructive  mission.  The  questions 
she  needs  to  ask  at  every  stage,  and  never  more 
stringently  than  in  this  day  of  crisis,  are  :  "  Have 
we  grasped  the  nature  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  ? 
Are  we  building  it  with  the  right  materials? 
Do  we  really  know  that  for  which  we  stand,  and 
do  we  know  it  in  such  a  way  as  to  be  able  to 
interpret  it  to  the  mind  of  the  age  ?  "  To  insist 
upon  this  is  not  to  take  an  intellectualistic  view 
of  the  Church's  function  :  it  is  rather  to  demand 
that  her  faith  should  be  "  full  of  eyes,"  her  love 
radiant  with  intelligence,  her  will  backed  by 
insight,  her  aspirations  informed  with  a  positive 
content.  Knowledge  of  the  truth  and  faithful- 
ness to  the  truth  may  be  a  dry  and  barren  business 
out  of  all  relation  to  life — it  entirely  depends  on 
what  is  understood  by  "  truth."  The  truth  we 
are  concerned  with  is  also  a  way  and  a  life.  It 
is  a  truth  which  demands  the  most  perfect  con- 

58 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

currence  of  the  intellect,  emotions,  and  will  for 
its  apprehension.  To  know  it  is  to  have  eternal 
life  ;  to  be  faithful  to  it  is  life  abundant.  It 
is  intellectual  enough  to  give  birth  to  philosophies 
and  theologies  which  leave  the  mind  breathless 
on  the  utmost  edge  of  thought ;  yet  it  is  too  vital 
to  be  confined  within  the  bounds  of  any  system, 
and  can  be  grasped  only  in  the  passionate  ex- 
perience of  the  soul  that  loves  and  dares. 

None  the  less,  the  understanding  has  a  certain 
inalienable  primacy  in  the  Christian  conception 
of  truth.  It  does  not  come  first  in  order  of  time, 
but  it  gives  that  which  does  come  first  its  full 
content,  significance,  and  power.  It  makes  the 
Gospel — the  good  news  from  God — influential 
over  the  whole  area  of  life  and  knowledge,  where 
otherwise  it  would  remain  a  remedial  measure  for 
moral  infirmity,  by  grasping  it  as  the  truth  of 
God.  The  pragmatic  conception  of  things  which 
has  for  nearly  a  generation  impoverished  our 
life  and  crippled  our  thought  has  left  us  all  but 
incapable  of  estimating  and  using  truth.  It  has 
identified  truth  with  mere  theory,  and  then 
opposed  to  it  the  conveniently  vague  idea  of 
"  life."  Within  the  Church  it  has  produced  a 
type  of  fervent  personal  devotion  to  Christ 
coupled  with  not  merely  ignorance  of,  but  positive 
unconcern  as  to,  the  meaning  and  import  of  His 
teaching.  Whenever  an  attempt  is  made  to 
advocate  a  more  serious  and  thoroughgoing 
contemplation  of  Divine  reality,  one  is  met  by 

59 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

the  objection  that  a  loving  heart  is  more  im- 
portant than  a  correct  intellectual  apprehension 
of  Christianity,  and  that  the  man  who  does  the 
will  of  God  is  more  highly  to  be  esteemed  than 
the  man  of  vision.  Such  a  conception  as  that 
of  being  sanctified  or  hallowed  in  the  truth, 
with  all  its  vital  suggestions  and  implications, 
is  largely  alien  to  the  prevailing  temper. 

Herein  is  one  great  cause  of  the  Church's 
present  weakness.  In  our  reaction  against  in- 
tellectualism  and  the  tyranny  of  the  theologian 
in  the  interests  of  the  spiritual  life,  we  have 
tended  to  forget  that  life  is  everywhere  blind 
and  inarticulate  except  as  it  is  lived  under  the 
power  of  truth.  We  lament  our  lack  of  "  moral 
and  spiritual  dynamic,"  and,  as  a  rule,,  we  mean 
nothing  more  by  the  term  than  a  great  uprush 
of  emotion  often  resulting  in  spectacular  action. 
What  we  really  and  supremely  need  is  the  dynamic 
of  a  clear,  steady,  spacious  vision,  and  of  a  dis- 
ciplined, progressive  apprehension  of  the  truth. 

Much  has  been  said  concerning  the  astounding 
vagueness  and  crudeness  of  the  religious  con- 
ceptions of  the  great  masses  of  men  outside  the 
Churches.  The  religion  of  the  average  English- 
man is  still  a  bald  and  depressing  Deism,  which 
under  the  pressure  of  anguish  either  breaks  down 
into  sheer  superstition,  or  is  swamped  by  the 
returning  faith  of  childhood.  But  what  is  far 
more  significant  is  the  vagueness  and  crudeness 
of  the  conceptions  held  by  large  numbers  within 

60 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

the  Churches.  It  is  not  the  instruction  of  those 
outside,  but  the  Christianisation — no  other  term 
is  adequate — of  the  faith  and  thought  of  the 
average  Church  member  that  constitutes  our 
most  immediate  problem.  Under  the  grim  in- 
quisition of  war,  the  secrets  of  many  hearts  have 
been  revealed.  Sorrow  has  unlocked  lips  that 
long  kept  silence  concerning  God,  and  bitter 
perplexity  has  forced  the  pent-up  doubts  of  a 
lifetime  into  the  open.  On  every  hand  one  is 
confronted  with  tragic  eclipses  of  faith — tragic, 
not  on  account  of  the  obscuring  cloud,  but  rather 
because  of  the  pathetic  flimsiness  of  the  faith 
thus  obscured.  The  most  poignantly  significant 
thing  about  the  self -revelations  of  anguished 
souls  that  the  war  has  extorted  is  their  unveiling 
of  the  non-Christian  character  ,of  the  faith  of  a 
large  proportion  of  Church  members.  Its  slender 
hold  on  Christian  doctrine  as  distinguished  from 
passively  or  superstitiously  accepted'  dogma,  its 
preponderantly  sentimental  character,  and  its 
extraordinary  ignorance  of  the  implications  of  the 
Gospel  conspire  to  make  it  an  exceedingly  frail 
and  brittle  thing,  vulnerable  to  the  lightest 
touch  of  contradiction.  Beneath  a  thin  crust 
of  unthinkingly-accepted  Christianity,  it  presents 
a  medley  of  pagan,  Jewish  and  mediaeval  con- 
ceptions. It  includes  Christ  as  a  piece  of  theo- 
logical machinery,  but  owes  little  to  His  influence 
as  a  living  Redeemer.  The  most  deep-going 
disillusionment  which  these  days  have  brought 

61 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

to  religious  teachers  and  leaders  is  the  discovery 
that  ideas  which  they  deemed  dead  and  done 
with  live  on  as  the  material  of  popular  faith, 
and  are  surprisingly  influential  even  with  those 
who  have  spent  all  their  lives  under  the  teaching 
of  the  Church.  Whatever  Deity  they  really  and 
profoundly  believe  in,  as  distinct  from  the  Deity 
they  pay  conventional  homage  to  in  church,  it 
is  not  the  God  and  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ. 

The  whole  religious  situation  of  to-day  is  a 
witness  to  the  poverty  and  shallowness  of  our 
knowledge  of  God.  Traditional  conceptions  have 
broken  down,  and  in  our  reaction  against  a  con- 
ception of  Christianity  which  transformed  the 
religion  of  Redemption  into  a  speculative  system, 
our  interest  has  shifted  from  theology  to  psy- 
chology. Until,  under  the  pressure  of  a  world- 
tragedy,  the  question,  What  is  God  really  like  ? 
swallowed  up  all  other  questions,  we  were  far 
more  concerned  with  the  soul  than  with  its 
Creator,  and  our  eager  investigations  of  the 
phenomena  of  religious  experience  covered  an 
ignorance  of,  and,  one  is  afraid,  an  indifference 
to,  its  Object  that  are  bearing  disastrous  fruit. 

Ill 

Nowhere  does  this  come  to  the  surface  more 
strikingly  than  in  the  place  where  we  least  think 
of  looking  for  it — the  realm  of  public  worship. 

63 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

Worship,  public  or  private,  has  largely  come  to 
be  a  thin  and  casual  affair,  empty  alike  of  in- 
tellectual gravity  and  spiritual  passion  ;  a  salu- 
tary custom,  indeed,  but  not  to  be  mentioned 
in  one  breath  with  the  obligation  to  social  service. 
Characterised  often  by  sheer  slovenliness,  it  lacks, 
even  in  its  most  punctilious  observance,  the 
fiery  edge  and  constraining  beauty  of  minds 
irradiated  by  the  splendour  of  truth  and  hearts 
subdued  by  Divine  mysteries.  Seldom  does  it 
exhibit  the  wonder  of  wide-eyed  faith  ;  hardly 
ever  does  it  run  up  into  eternity.  It  barely 
touches  the  fringe  of  life  ;  its  solemnities  appear 
trivial  beside  the  grim  facts  of  existence.  And 
the  root-cause  of  this  impotence  is  a  vague,  un- 
informed, shallow  conception  of  God.  This 
emerges  especially  in  prayer,  where  the  thought 
of  God  should  exercise  its  most  formative  in- 
fluence. Most  of  our  prayers — even  in  public 
worship — are  occupied  with  our  own  moods, 
our  own  needs,  whether  spiritual  or  temporal, 
rather  than  with  God.  How  much  of  them  is 
taken  up  with  self-analysis  and  self- commiser- 
ation, with  the  recital  of  our  struggles  and  the 
formulation  of  our  doubts !  As  we  pass  our 
prayer-life  under  review,  we  are  shamed  by  its 
colossal  egotism.  Man,  not  God,  is  in  the  fore- 
front. With  all  our  talk  about  "  getting  into 
tune  with  the  Infinite,"  "  practising/the  Presence 
of  God,"  or  however  our  theological  dialect  may 
phrase  it,  and  with  all  our  enlarged  conceptions 

63 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

of  the  dignity  and  wonder  of  life,  we  tend  to 
make  God  a  purveyor  instead  of  a  judge,  a  means 
instead  of  an  end. 

These  strictures  seem  to  suggest  the  egoistic 
and  essentially  materialistic  tendency  of  "  New 
Thought,"  which  seeks  to  use  spiritual  forces 
as  a  means  of  gaining  material  ends;  or  else 
the  crude  conception  of  prayer,  so  slow  to  die 
even  among  intelligent  folk,  according  to  which 
we  can  secure  any  object  on  which  our  heart  is 
set,  provided  only  we  pray  long  enough  and 
vehemently  enough.  But  what  one  has  in  mind  is 
a  far  subtler  tendency,  and  one  which  has  natu- 
ralised itself  within  the  Church  to  an  alarming 
degree — the  impulse  which  uses  prayer,  both 
vocal  and  silent,  as  a  means  for  attaining  calm 
of  soul,  spiritual  poise,  a  sense  of  mastery  over 
life.  This  cult  of  power  is  not  new.  It  is  as 
old  as  Christianity,  taking  different  forms  in  each 
successive  age.  And  not  one  of  the  least  sig- 
nificant things  about  it  is  that  while  it  is  pro- 
moted in  the  interests  of  a  higher  ethic  than  that 
of  the  average  believer,  history  has  abundantly 
proved  that  it  almost  invariably  ends  in  pro- 
ducing a  lower  ethic.  This  is  not  to  be  wondered 
at,  for  it  is  rooted  in  a  false  and  unworthy  thought 
of  God.  It  presupposes  a  Deity  who  exists 
mainly  for  the  spiritual  self -aggrandisement  of 
His  creatures  ;  who  is,  in  *fact,  the  great  means 
of  their  self-culture — one  might  almost  say,  the 
apparatus    for    their    religious    gymnastics.     To 

64 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

urge  that  the  self-enlargement  sought  is  spiritual, 
and  that  it  is  coveted  for  the  sake  of  the  world, 
does  not  mend  matters.  It  is  merely  a  new 
version  of  the  old  fallacy  that  it  does  not  matter 
how  a  man's  wealth  is  gained,  so  long  as  his 
personal  tastes  are  refined,  and  he  contributes 
largely  to  charity. 

It  has  been  argued  that  the  essentially  selfish 
and  self-bounded  character  of  much  of  our  worship 
is  the  fruit  of  Protestant  individualism  and  in- 
tellectualism.  Protestantism,  it  is  urged,  has 
so  exaggerated  the  importance  of  preaching  as 
to  reduce  the  devotional  element  to  the  level  of 
mere  "  preliminaries,"  and  laid  so  one-sided  an 
emphasis  upon  the  subjective  needs  of  the  in- 
dividual as  to  breed  a  fatal  self-absorption  which 
has  no  eyes  for  God.  The  one  and  only  remedy 
for  such  a  perverted  religious  consciousness  is  to 
be  found  in  the  restoration  of  the  Sacrament  to 
its  rightful  place  at  the  centre  of  Christian  wor- 
ship. We  must  once  more  come  to  know  the 
Lord  in  the  breaking  of  bread.  At  the  heart 
of  the  Gospel  is  not  the  acceptance  of  a  message 
from  God,  but  ,;the  self-giving  of  God  ;  and  we 
appropriate  the  Gospel,  not  when  we  accept  a 
doctrine,  but  when  we  have  communion  with 
the  broken  Body  of  Christ. 

But  while  there  is  a  profound  truth  in  this 
view,  it  offers  neither  a  correct  diagnosis  nor 
a  complete  remedy.  The  fundamental  cause  of 
our  inadequate  worship  is  neither  intellectualism 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

nor  individualism,  though  both  have  contributed 
to  its  enfeebling,  but  simply  an  inadequate 
thought  of  God.  Worship  is  adoration  and 
devotion,  but  it  does  not  live  by  mere  adoration 
and  devotion  ;  it  feeds  and  grows  upon  the 
worshipper's  enlarging  apprehension  of  the  truth. 
No  mere  emotional  fervour,  no  blind  sacra- 
mental communion,  can  take  the  place  of  a 
mind  stretching  towards  the  truth,  and  thus 
being  purified  to  moral  penetration,  disciplined 
to  intellectual  gravity,  kindled  to  spiritual 
splendour.  "No  Gospel,  no  Mass"  is  the  funda- 
mental axiom  of  all  true  worship.  Communion 
which  is  not  communion  with  Him  who  opens 
all  Scriptures  and  feeds  the  growing  soul  of 
discipleship  with  words  of  eternal  life  is  sfreer 
superstition. 

This  does  not  imply,  of  course,  that  worship 
is  an  intellectual  exercise,  or  that  the  prophetic 
function  of  the  inspired  mind  is  of  more  account 
than  the  priestly  consecration  of  the  devoted 
soul.  Worship  is  not  vision  merely,  but  self- 
oblation — the  presenting  of  body  and  soul  as  a 
pure  sacrifice.  Yet  it  is  the  soul's  deepening 
insight  into  f  truth  translated  into  holy  living 
that  gives  that  sacrifice  its  character  and  value. 
It  is  only  as  penetrated  and  irradiated  by  the 
active  spiritual  intelligence  that  our  self-oblation 
is  indeed  an  offering  of  our  integral  and  undivided 
personality,  and  not  merely  the  surface  movement 
of  emotional  surrender.     If  the  Protestant  pulpit 

66 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

of  to-day*  has  tended  to  weaken  the  devotional 
impulse  and  to  depress  worship,  it  is  not  because 
it  has  unduly  exalted  the  function  of  the  intellect 
in  religion,  but,  on  the  contrary,  because  it  has 
largely  failed  to  give  religious  feeling  a  positive 
and  coherent  content.  It  has  tended  to  dwell 
upon  the  minor  moods  and  tenses  of  religious 
experience,  to  minister  to  the  temperamental 
impressionism  of  the  age  instead  of  to  its  spiritual 
needs,  to  take  the  idiosyncrasies  of  the  soul  too 
seriously  and  the  principles  of  the  Gospel- not 
seriously  enough.  To  so  large  an  extent,  indeed, 
has  the  pulpit  abdicated  its  teaching  function 
that  it  is  possible  for  a  man  to  hear  one-hundred- 
and-four  sermons  a  year,  and  yet  remain  patheti- 
cally ignorant  of  the  great  doctrines  of  Christianity 
in  their  deeper  aspects  and  implications.  When 
James  Smetham  finds  it  possible  to  write,  "I 
know  no  more  intellectually  of  the  truth  to-day 
than  when  I  first  believed,' '  and  to  acquiesce 
with  entire  equanimity  in  his  arrested  develop- 
ment, the  fact  that  he  was  none  the  less  a  beautiful 
and  devout  soul  may  obscure,  but  does  not  lessen 
by  one  iota,  the  tragedy  of  such  a  confession. 
And  whatever  may  be  true  of  individuals  here 
and  there,  worship  on  the  large  scale  must  either 
harden    to   formality   or  soften  to  blind   senti- 

*  No  doubt  the  Protestant  pulpit  of  the  past  was  character- 
ised by  a  dry  and  intellectualistic  orthodoxy,  but  English  Pro- 
testantism remained  largely  immune  from  an  influence  which 
sapped  the  very  Kfe  of  the  Continental  Protestant  Churches. 

67 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

mentalism,  unless  it  is  nourished  by  a  true  and 
expanding  thought  of  God. 

Moreover,  a  true  conception  of  God  involves 
a  due  emphasis  upon  the  rights  of  human  per- 
sonality. The  weakness  of  popular  Protestant 
teaching  is  not,  as  its  critics  seem  to  think,  that 
it  has  over-emphasised  the  claims  of  personality, 
but  that  it  has  laid  a  disproportionate  emphasis 
upon  the  individual's  right  to  judge  for  himself, 
and  upon  his  craving  for  spiritual  comfort  and 
happiness.  The  result  has  been  an  attitude  of 
religious  self-obsession  —  a  type  of  mind  that 
accepts  nothing  which  does  not  minister  to  its 
emotional  craving,  and  is  almost  incapable  of 
anything  like  steady  reflection  upon  objective 
reality.  Again,  the  remedy  is  not  a  correspond- 
ingly one-sided  insistence  upon  adoration  and 
devotion,  whether  expressed  in  sacramental 
worship  or  not,  but  a  truer  doctrine  of  God  and 
of  human  personality  in  relation  to  God.  It  is 
not  insignificant  that  the  book  dealing  with 
religious  problems  of  the  hour  which  pleads 
most  insistently  for  a  restoration  of  the  Eucharist 
to  its  central  place  in  Christian  worship,  also 
asserts  with  unqualified  emphasis  that  one  great 
reason  for  the  alienation  of  the  masses  of  men 
from  Christianity  is  due  to  the  failure  of  the 
Church  as  a  teaching  institution.  In  that  volume, 
"  The  Church  in  the  Furnace,"  seventeen  Anglican 
chaplains,  expressing  their  minds  with  whole- 
some frankness,  bear  cumulative  witness  to  the 

68 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

tragedy  of  a  Church  that  has  ceased  to  -teach 
and  enlighten.  With  Germany  to  brand  it  in 
upon  our  reluctant  minds  that  ideas  are  not 
harmless  arm-chair  amusements,  but  moral  dyna- 
mite, dare  we  doubt  any  longer  that  the  prophet 
spoke  truly  when  he  cried,  "  My  people  are 
destroyed  for  lack  of  knowledge." 


IV 

The  supreme  need  'of  the  ministry  to-day  is 
to  recover  its  teaching  function.  Two  genera- 
tions ago  the  man  in  the  pew  received  an  aston- 
ishing amount  of  solid  religious  instruction  from 
the  pulpit.  We  are  far  too  ready  to  smile  at 
the  exceeding  "  stodginess  "  of  matter  and  pom- 
posity of  manner  which  characterised  this  in- 
struction, and  to  take  it  for  granted  that  its 
result  was  merely  an  intellectual  assent  having 
no  deep  influence  upon  the  hearer's  life.  Both 
these  strictures  are  superficial.  What  sounds 
tedious  and  magniloquent  to  us  came  with  living 
power  to  the  men  of  an  earlier  generation,  and 
while  many  aspects  of  the  Gospel — chiefly  its 
social  implications— were  not  understood  by  them, 
what  was  understood  exercised  a  profound  in- 
fluence upon  life  and  conduct  within  its  own 
range.  We  may  marvel  at  the  narrowness  and 
dogmatism  of  Victorian  religion,  but  there  is 
no  foundation  whatever  for  asserting   that  the 

69 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Victorian  Church  member  failed  "  to  live  up  to 
his  lights."  On  the  contrary,  everything  goes 
to  show  that  the  teaching  received  and  assimilated 
by  him,  however  defective,  and  in  some  ways 
frankly  repellent,  entered  the  very  fibre  of  his 
being,  with  the  result  that,  in  spite  of  his  primness 
and  complacency,  his  demure  love  of  comfort, 
and  his  exasperating  acquiescence  in  the  things 
that  are,  he  lived  under  the  power  of  liis  con- 
sciousness of  God  as  many  of  us  do  not,  and  had 
a  sense  of  responsibility  and  stewardship  which 
this  age  of  social  enthusiasms  curiously  lacks. 

To-day  we  have  exhausted  the  fund  of  re- 
ligious knowledge  which  former  generations  have 
bequeathed  to  us.  The  theological  terminology 
of  a  past  age  has  lost  its  meaning  for  us  ;  its 
formulae  have,  to  a  considerable  extent,  ceased 
to  be  adequate  to  our  understanding  of  ultimate 
reality.  The  neatness  and  finality  of  its  defini- 
tions repel  us  ;  its  exclusion  of  whole  tracts  of 
life  that  we  have  learnt  to  think  of  as  sacred 
fills  us  with  amazement.  Moreover,  in  our  re- 
vulsion from  a  barrenly  intellectualistic  attitude, 
we  have  come  to  minimise  the  importance  of  a 
teaching  ministry.  We  like  to  remind  ourselves 
that  Christianity  cannot  be  taught  like  arith- 
metic ;  that  it  is  a  Divine  touch,  the  motion  of 
the  wind  that  bloweth  where  it  listeth  ;  an 
attitude,  a  life.  We  do  not  want  to  be  instructed 
from  the  pulpit  ;  we  want  to  be  impressed  and 
appealed  to  ;    we  want  the  preacher  to  create  an 

70 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

atmosphere,  to  wield  the  magic  wand  of  spiritual 
evocation.  We  do  not  want  so  much  to  under- 
stand as  to  experience — to  feel  the  touch  of  God 
upon  our  souls  ;  to  know,  in  the  region  where 
words  fail,  that  we  are  one  with  Him.  We  are 
weary  of  the  exasperating  logomachies,  the  un- 
helpful antiquarianism  of  doctrinal  discussion. 
We  long  for  movement,  colour,  dynamic  life. 
We  are  impatient  even  of  the  great  mystical 
doctrines,  for,  after  all,  religion  as  an  intense 
inward  experience  is  not  possible  to  every  man  ; 
religion  in  that  sense  is  surely  "  a  matter  of 
temperament,  like  a  taste  for  music — or  for 
mustard/ '  But  to  find  God  in  the  rhythm  of 
common  life,  to  see  Him  in  the  brother  whom 
we  help  and  love,  to  feel  His  Spirit  pulsing  through 
the  great  movements  of  the  age — that  is  open 
to  all.  What  we  need  is  not  professors  of  theology 
in  the  pulpit,  but  prophets  of  the  spiritual  im- 
pulse, seers  who  will  teach  us  how  to  discern 
the  Way  of  God  in  the  ways  of  contemporary 
history ;  mystics,  if  you  will,  but  practical 
mystics,  who  will  show  us  the  sacramental  value 
of  Borough  Councils  and  Welfare  Committees. 

The  truth  of  all  this  need  not  be  especially 
emphasised  at  this  late  day.  Christianity  is 
obviously  not  a  theological  system,  a  neat  "  plan 
of  salvation/'  but  an  experience  involving  the 
whole  personality  and  revolutionising  a  man's 
social  relations  as  well  as  his  personal  conduct. 
But  we  do  not  experience  Christianity  by  simply 

7i 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

stating  with  reiterative  emphasis  that  it  is  an 
experience  and  not  a  creed,  and  it  sometimes 
looks  as  if  there  were  less  rather  than  more 
genuine  first-hand  Christian  experience  among  us 
since  we  began  to  concentrate  upon  "  the  religion 
of  experience.' '  With  all  our  insistence  upon  the 
vital  character  of  Christianity,  we  are  not  pro- 
ducing a  conspicuously  large  number  of  vital 
Christian  personalities.  Our  emergence  from  a 
conventional  observance  of  religion  has  thinned 
the  ranks  of  our  Church  membership,  but  it  has 
not  made  those  that  remain  within,  the  Church 
more  whole-heartedly  Christian  ;  on  the  con- 
trary, our  spiritual  proletariat  has  never  been 
larger  in  proportion  to  our  total  Church  member- 
ship than  it  is  to-day.  Every  Church  can  show 
multitudes  of  excellent  men  and  women  open  to 
religious  impressions,  eager  to  serve  along  in- 
stitutional lines,  always  ready  to  give  and  help, 
but  lacking  definite  spiritual  personality.  They 
are  most  lovable,  as  a  rule ;  their  immunity  from 
priggishness  and  Pharisaism  is  a  relief  after  the 
hardness  and  self-consciousness  of  the  conven- 
tionally spiritual,  and  they  abound  in  the  most 
hopeful  possibilities.  But,  in  their  present  con- 
dition, they  are  not  spiritual  entities ;  and 
unless  they  are  helped  to  their  legitimate  develop- 
ment, 'they  will  end  in  religious  sub-normality, 
in  chronic  minority. 

The  reason  for  this  is  not  far  to    seek.     In 
belittling  the  need  of  teaching,  we  are  depriving 

72 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

ourselves  of  the  very  factor  by  which  our  ex- 
perience of  Christianity  is  lifted  above  the  mists 
of  mere  feeling.  As  we  have  reminded  ourselves 
already,  experience  is  little  more  than  an  instinct, 
or  a  fleeting  mood,  unless  reflected  upon  and 
interpreted  by  the  reason.  And  further,  ex- 
perience presupposes  knowledge  to  a  far  greater 
extent  than  we  are  prepared  to  admit.  It  was 
not  for  nothing  that  Jesus  taught  His  disciples 
daily  for  three  years  before  He  died  and  rose 
again  ;  it  is  not  for  nothing  that  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  conceived  of  as  imparting  the  things  Christ 
has  yet  to  say  to  His  disciples.  While  experience 
can  come,  and  has  come  again  and  again,  to 
untaught  souls,  that  articulated  body  of  ex- 
perience which  makes  the  complete  man  in  Christ 
Jesus  cannot  come  in  its  most  vitally  influential 
power  without  a  basis  of  knowledge.  Much  of 
what  we  call  experience  is  nothing  else  than  the 
sudden  vitalising  of  latent  knowledge  mechanic- 
ally absorbed  and  unconsciously  retained.  We 
need  to  realise  how  much  we  owe  to  that  un- 
critical and  quasi-mechanical  acceptance  of  tra- 
ditional religious  knowledge  which  set  us  free 
to  turn  our  attention,  to  the  new  impulses  and 
tasks  of  a  later  day.*     All  the  time,  while  we 

*  Dr.  Hort  deals  with  this  point  in  his  classic  treatise,  "  The 
Way,  the  Truth,  the  Life,"  pp.  86-88.  The  whole  chapter  is 
pre-eminently  worth  reading  in  this  connection.  Dr.  Hort  shows 
in  inimitable  fashion  how,  in  the  apprehension  of  the  Gospel  as 
truth,  an  endless  future  is  opened  for  all  knowledge  and  all 
devotion. 

73 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

turned  from  the  theological  aspect  of  Christianity 
to  enter  more  deeply  into  its  practical  implica- 
tions, we  were  being  unconsciously  nourished  on 
our  inherited  store  of  knowledge.  That  inherit- 
ance is  failing  us  to-day.  And  unless  we  replace 
it  by  a  newly-won  intellectual  grasp  and  formu- 
lation of  our  deepest  religious  convictions,  which 
shall  impose  upon  us  a  discipline  as  severe  and 
educative  as  that  which  traditional  forms  of 
belief  imposed  upon  our  fathers,  we  shall  surely 
lose  our  souls  in  the  name  of  freedom. 

The  present-day  pulpit,  where  it  has  been 
alive  to  the  tremendous  issues  of  the  hour,  has 
tended,  to  a  considerable  extent,  to  substitute 
a  ministry  of  censure  for  a  ministry  of  teaching. 
Exhortation  mingled  with  reproach  has  become 
the  keynote  of  preaching  in  not  a  few  quarters, 
and  only  too  often  it  reduces  itself  to  a  demand 
to  make  bricks  without  straw.  Thus,  for  in- 
stance, we  are  incessantly  exhorted  to  a  more 
passionate  and  adventurous  religious  attitude. 
If  patriotism  can  evoke  so  heroic  a  passion,  ought 
not  the  call  of  Christ  to  win  at  least  as  intense 
a  response  ? 

That  Christ  can  indeed  kindle  the  soul  to 
a  passion  beside  which  the  flame  of  patriot- 
ism pales  to  a  shadow  is  graven  deep  upon  the 
Church's  records.  But  as  one  listens  to  these 
reiterative  demands  for  spiritual  passion,  one  is 
haunted  by  the  uncomfortable  suspicion  that 
even  the  low  degree  of  fervour  and  zeal  found 

74 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

in  the  Church  to-day  has  not  sufficient  reality 
behind  it,  is  not  sufficiently  rooted  in  vital  know- 
ledge to  justify  it  as  an  authentic  movement  of 
the  soul. 

What  does  the  average  church-goer  really 
know  of  Christ  as  One  who  re-creates  the 
soul  at  its  central  depth ;  to  what  extent  has  he 
entered  into  the  purposes  of  the  Kingdom;  what 
grasp  has  he  of  the  world-wide  sweep  and  the 
intimate  workings  of  redeeming  Love  that  could 
create  an  increase  of  genuine  passion  as  distinct 
from  mere  nervous  emotion  ? 

It  is  not  theological  knowledge  that  is  in 
question  here,  but  the  deep  pondering  of  the  heart 
that  loves.  It  is  Experience  in  its  fullest  sense 
that  is  needed — experience  which  includes  an 
ever-deepening  insight  into  the  mind  of  Christ, 
a  feeding  of  the  spiritual  intelligence  upon  His 
words  of  eternal  life.  It  is  this  deeper  and  more 
truly  experimental  penetration  into  the  secret  of 
Christianity  that  needs  to  be  preached  to-day. 
To  stir  men  to  their  crying  need  of  that  grasp 
upon  reality  which  creates  passion  for  Christ's 
cause,  and  so  passion  for  all  great  causes,  is  the 
preacher's  task.  The  mere  exhortation  to  be 
more  passionate  only  serves  to  obscure  this  need, 
and  in  the  long  run  produces  an  amazing  blunt- 
ness  and  indifference.  The  pulpit  that  abdicates 
its  teaching  function  to-day  is  on  the  way  to 
kill  the  ideals  it  most  strenuously  advocates. 
To  teach,  in  the  fullest  sense  of  that  term,  leading 

75 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

people  into  the  truth  and  not  merely  describing 
the  outward  vesture  of  truth  ;  to  teach  with  the 
combined  fearlessness  and  awe  of  those  who  dare 
to  trust  the  Spirit's  present  guidance,  is  the  only 
salvation  of  the  pulpit.  A  blind  faith  that  can 
give  no  account  of  itself,  a  rootless  emotion  that 
fails  in  the  face  of  grim  realities,  a  mindless  en- 
thusiasm for  something  that  remains  unknown 
through  sheer  mental  indolence — these  things 
are  fully  as  disastrous  as  a  conventionally 
accepted  theology.  The  preacher  who  can  teach 
experimentally,  i.e.,  who  can  present  his  thought 
as  the  living  product  of  his  own  experience,  will 
meet  with  a  response  that  will  astonish  him. 


NOTE 

Since  this  chapter  was  in  type,  the  Archbishops'  First 
Committee  of  Inquiry  has  issued  its  Report  on  "  The  Teach- 
ing Office  of  the  Church  " — a  document  profoundly  significant 
both  as  a  frank  confession  of  failure  and  as  a  call  to  imme- 
diate and  radical  action.  In  its  insistence  upon  the  in- 
tellectual element  in  the  Church's  message,  and  upon  the 
need  for  presenting  that  message  in  terms  of  current  thought, 
it  corroborates  all  that  has  been  said  above  on  this  point. 
It  specially  emphasises  the  intellectual  weakness  and  defec- 
tive training  of  the  clergy  as  a  primary  cause  of  the  Church's 
failure  as  a  teacher  ;  demands  that  the  training  for  the 
ministry  be  made  the  concern  of  the  Church  as  a  whole,  and 
a  first  charge  upon  her  revenues  ;  and  makes  definite  practical 

76 


The  Church  as  Teacher 

recommendations  towards  securing  a  higher  standard  of 
ministerial  competence.  In  this  emphasis  many  see  the 
most  important  feature  of  the  Report ;  but  it  should  be 
borne  in  mind  that,  as  a  point  of  fact,  some  of  the  Free 
Churches  have  already  a  standard  of  training  equal  to,  and, 
in  the  case  of  the  Presbyterian  Churches,  greatly  in  advance 
of,  that  suggested  in  the  Committee's  recommendations,  and 
that  yet  they  too  have  lost  heavily  within  the  last  decade. 
After  all,  our  primary  concern  to-day  is  with  the  contents 
of  the  Church's  message  rather  than  with  the  method  of 
conveying  it ;  and  our  first  task  is  to  determine  afresh  what 
that  message  really  is,  to  re-think  it  in  the  light  of  a  new 
day,  and  to  re-appropriate  it  experimentally. 

It  is  when  the  Committee  turns  its  attention  to  theo- 
logical reconstruction  that  its  utterances  seem  to  us  of  prime 
importance.  In  dealing  with  the  question  of  "  Examination 
for  Ordination  "  they  pass  the  present  Examination  Syllabus 
under  stringent  review.  They  point  out  that  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles,  which,  with  the  Creeds,  form  the  subject-matter  of 
the  present  examination  in  theology,  have  nothing  to  say 
concerning  "  the  great  truths  of  the  Divine  Fatherhood,  of 
God's  immanence  and  transcendence,  of  His  eternal  purpose 
for  the  world,  and  of  the  Kingdom  for  whose  establishment 
He  calls  us  to  cooperate  with  Him."  They  begin  with  the 
doctrine  of  Original  Sin  ;  of  the  fact  of  actual  sin  they  have 
little  to  say  ;  of  man's  original  glorious  nature  in  the  image 
of  God,  nothing.  They  reveal  nothing  of  the  mind  and  heart 
of  God  towards  us,  reducing  the  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  to  "  a  kind  of  moral  connoisseur."  The  result  is,  as 
one  clergyman  put  it,  that  "  there  are  a  good  many  people 
who  believe  in  the  Blessed  Sacrament,  but  do  not  believe 
in  Almighty  God."  The  Report  also  lays  emphasis  upon 
the  neglect  of  the  subject  of  Christian  morals — a  neglect 
easily  accounted  for  by  the  Church's  weak  grasp  upon  the 

77 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

doctrines  upon  which  Christian  morals  are  based.  It  reminds 
us  that  the  attack  upon  Christianity  is  to-day  passing  from 
doctrine  to  morals,  and  that  "  while  such  old  standard  books 
as  Pearson's  "  Exposition  of  the  Creed,"  and  Nelson's  "  Fasts 
and  Festivals,"  made  a  real  effort  to  exhibit  the  moral 
bearings  of  Christian  truth;  those  which  have  taken  their 
place  do  not."  The  whole  Report  is  one  powerful,  cumu- 
lative, convincing  plea  for  that  new  thought  of  God  with 
which  Chapter  IV.  of  this  book  attempts  to  deal. 


78 


CHAPTER    IV 

The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

I 

Behind  the  languor  of  present-day  religious  life 
is  the  lack  of  a  new  thought  of  God — a  profound, 
creative  conception  that  shall  weld  our  fragmen- 
tary experience  into  a  coherent  and  intelligible 
whole.  That  new  experience  has  been  granted 
us  we  dare  not  doubt.  We  have  touched  God  at 
points  at  which  a  former  generation  would  have 
deemed  it  impious  to  look  for  Him,  gained  in- 
sights into  His  purposes  which  re-created  our 
world  and  gave  a  new  spaciousness  to  life,  realised 
our  corporate  relation  to  Him  as  the  ages  of 
individualism  could  not  do.  Yet,  with  all  this 
spiritual  wealth,  we  lack  a  deep,  true  thought 
of  God  ;  and  the  reason  is  not  far  to  seek.  While 
we  are  eager  to  touch  life  at  every  point,  while 
large  numbers  are  anxious  to  make  contact  with 
that  spiritual  world  of  which  they  are  increasingly 
convinced,  we  largely  lack  any  intense  and 
impelling  longing  to  know  God  as  a  Person  ; 
to  know  Him  intimately,  profoundly,  and  at 
first-hand ;  to  apprehend  Him  as  well  as  to 
feel  Him  ;   to  know  Him  with  the  understanding 

79 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  not  merely  with  the  religious  instincts.  It 
was  this  longing  which  drove  men  of  old,  not 
merely  to  live  in  the  light  that  shames  and  purifies, 
but  also  to  think  deeply,  patiently,  yea,  passion- 
ately, until  out  of  this  interaction  of  gnosis  and 
praxis,  this  rubbing  together  of  life  and  action 
out  of  which  all  true  fire  and  light  proceed,  there 
came  thoughts  of  God  that  moulded  the  lives  of 
Churches  and  nations  and  created  mighty  world- 
movements. 

All  through  history  there  have  been  drab 
and  arid  periods  in  which  man's  longing  for  God 
grew  faint  and  dim.  Between  the  Reformation 
and  the  Evangelical  Revival  there  stretched  such 
an  arid  desert ;  and  when  the  hand  of  Wesley 
rekindled  fires  that  had  all  but  died  out,  it  did 
not  wholly  restore  what  had  been  lost.  It  brought 
back  the  warm  emotion  of  the  heart  that  cannot 
rest  until  it  has  found  the  eternal  Heart  of  Love  ; 
it  did  not  bring  back  the  passion  of  the  mind 
that  craves  to  apprehend  the  Infinite  Mind.  In 
its  reaction,  from  a  rationalistic  conception  of 
Christianity,  it  tended  to  disparage  the  function 
of  reason  in  man's  experience  of  God.  It  pro- 
duced great  experimentalists — men  who  spoke 
with  authority,  as  those  who  knew  with  a  know- 
ledge so  immediate  and  unshakable  as  to  put 
it  beyond  the  pale  of  argument — but  it  did  not 
produce  great  thinkers.  Its  roll  of  honour  in- 
cludes no  names  like  those  which  made  the  massive 
race  of  Puritan  divines  illustrious,  no  men  who 

80 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

were  at  once  speculative  thinkers  and  profound 
psychologists  of  the  Christian  experience.  It 
may,  in  fact,  be  said  to  mark  the  starting-point 
of  that  reaction  against  intellectualism  which, 
especially  when  in  Hegel  intellectualism  spoke 
its  last  word,  tended  to  make  experience  entirely 
emotional  and  to  conceive  of  thought  as  divorced 
from  life.  By  the  time  of  Kingsley  and  Maurice, 
people  in  general  had  lost  that  interest  in  theo- 
logical thought  which  gave  the  Puritan  pulpit 
so  matchless  an  opportunity,  and  theologians 
were,  on  the  whole,  strangely  devoid  of  experi- 
mental interest.  With  Ritschl  that  interest  came 
into  its  own  again  ;  but  Ritschlianism,  in  righting 
against  a  metaphysical  theology,  opposed  to  it, 
on  the  one  hand,  a  philosophical  scepticism,  and, 
on  the  other,  a  narrow  and  dogmatic  historicity 
which  could  not  survive  criticism.  It  had  no 
psychology  of  the  Christian  experience,  and 
calmly  relegated  the  soul's  immediate  certainties 
to  the  realm  of  mysticism,  by  which  was  under- 
stood something  purely  subjective,  if  not  actually 
pathological. 

For  the  past  fifty  years  there  has  been  much 
discussion  as  to  the  nature  of  God,  but  little 
genuine  thinking.  Popular  apologetics  has  re- 
mained, to  a  large  though  decreasing  extent,  a 
matter  of  cheap  argument  and  smart  retort. 
Men  have  been  more  or  less  interested  in  God, 
and  more  or  less  curious  about  Him;  but  of  a 
consuming  desire  to  know  Him  and  hold  com- 

G  81 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

munion  with  Him  there  has  been  comparatively 
little.  Even  in  religiously  -  inclined  circles,  a 
superficial  spiritual  eagerness  conceals  a  poverty 
of  dynamic  desire.  Everyone  wishes  to  know 
God  a  little,  but  few  take  pains  to  know  Him 
much  ;  and  while  spiritual  phenomena  are  eagerly 
investigated,  their  Source  is  neglected.  The  great 
wave  of  humanism  which  has  captured  religious 
souls  has  shown  the  inhumanness  of  certain 
current  conceptions  of  God,  the  meanness  of  the 
common  idea  of  divinity  as  compared  to  the 
nobility  of  man.  Briefly,  our  vision  has  been 
sharpened,  and  we  are  becoming  adepts  at  criti- 
cising defective  views  of  God ;  but  we  still  lack 
that  passion  for  God,  that  overmastering  sense 
of  our  need  of  Him  and  our  affiliation  to  Him, 
which  will  drive  us  to  re-think  our  conception 
of  Him  with  all  the  energy  of  brain  and  soul  of 
which  we  are  capable. 

We  have  seen  how  in  our  very  acts  of  worship 
our  lack  of  real  contact  with  God  is  apparent, 
how  even  the  most  spiritual  are  dogged  by  the 
temptation  to  make  God  the  means  and  their 
perfecting  the  end.  There  is  no  escape  from 
this  except  by  sinking  ever  more  deeply  into 
the  thought  of  God.  We  must  at  all  costs  have 
a  God  who  so  smites  us  wit]i  a"  sense  of  His  majesty, 
beauty,  and  surpassing  wonder,  that,  so  far  from 
presuming  to  use  Him,  we  shall  scarcely  dare 
ask  Him  to  use  us.  We  need  a  God  who  so  loves 
men,  and  so  sorrows  with  and  suffers  for  them, 

83 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

that  at  the  sight  of  such  love  our  selfishness 
dies  within  us,  and  even  the  thought  of  our  most 
spiritual  self  is  lost  in  a  consuming  desire  to 
give  Him  love  for  love.  We  need  a  God  whose 
purposes  towards  ourselves  and  the  world  are  so 
stupendous  that,  as  we  begin  to  apprehend  some- 
thing of  their  length  and  breadth  and  depth 
and  height,  we  tread  our  own  small  plans — even 
our  plans  for  the  good  of  others — under  foot, 
and  humbly  offer  ourselves  to  Him  for  the  build- 
ing of  His  Kingdom.  We  need,  in  short,  a  God 
who  possesses  and  masters  us.  And  if  our  thought 
of  God  is  so  to  possess  and  sway  our  deepest 
heart,  it  must  be  beaten  out  on  the  anvil  of  the 
mind.  No  swiftness  of  insight  or  leaping  flame 
of  emotion  can  absolve  the  intellect  from  its 
task.  We  need  a  conception  of  God  as  philo- 
sophic as  that  of  the  Greek  Fathers,  as  mighty 
as  that  of  the  Reformers  and  Puritans,  and  as 
ethically  searching  as  a  new  social  consciousness 
can  make  it. 


II 

How  are  we  to  arrive  at  such  a  conception  ? 
Already  that  shallow  curiosity  about  the  spiritual 
world  which  has  killed  all  true  thinking  is  giving 
place  here  and  there  to  a  new  wistfulness,  and, 
what  is  more,  to  a  new  teachableness.  Men  are 
far  more  ready  now  than  they  were  five  years 
ago  to  listen  to  the  teacher  or  community  that 

83 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

can  "give  them  a  new  thought  of  God.  What 
liave  we  to  say  to  them  ?  Our  first  step  clearly 
must  be  to  disentangle  the  specifically  and  funda- 
mentally Christian  conception  of  God  from  the 
accretions  that  have  gathered  round  it,  and  the 
modifications  which  have  improved  it  out  of 
existence.  Certain  old  and  vdry  simple  lines  of 
thought,  familiar  to  some  of  us  since  our  school- 
days, may  serve  as  a  guiding  thread  through  a 
labyrinth  of  overlapping  presentations,  and  recall 
us  to  the  material  out  of  which  a  constructive 
conception  of  God  must  be  built. 

In  this  old  and  very  effective  system  of  medi- 
tation we  were  invited  to  picture  an  average 
individual — just  a  common,  insignificant  man  or 
woman,  without  any  charm  or  distinction,  and 
with  a  thousand  irritating  and  unlovely  qualities. 
We  were  told  to  consider  such  an  individual  in 
relation  to  nature  and  to  the  race  ;  what  is  he 
but  the  merest  speck  upon  the  landscape,  so 
insignificant,  so  irrelevant,  that  it  takes  an  effort 
to  become  aware  of  his  presence  at  all  ?  Yet, 
difficult  though  it  be  to  believe,  he  is  a  person 
of  fremendous  importance.  Three  stupendous 
facts  conspire  to  give  him  a  dignity  which  kings 
might  envy.  To  begin  with,  he  is  the  object  of 
his  Creator's  love — of  a  love  as  distinct  and  in- 
dividual as  though  he  were  the  only  being  in  the 
universe.  God  does  not  merely  value  him  as  a 
pawn  in  the  game — a  cog,  small  yet  indispensable, 
in  the  machinery  of  the  universe  ;    He  values 

84 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

him  as  something  altogether  unique,  something, 
to  be  ardently  coveted  and  supremely  prized. 
Upon  him  the  Everlasting  Love  is  fastened  with 
a  brooding  tenderness  of  which  the  love  of  a 
lover  for  his  beloved  is  but  a  faint  shadow.  Upon 
him  the  Eternal  Mind  is  concentrated  with  a 
solicitude  we  cannot  measure.  Not  all  the  respect 
paid  to  the  great  ones  of  earth  is  comparable  for 
a  moment  to  the  reverence  of  the  Creator  for 
this  most  poor  and  commonplace  of  creatures. 

That  is  one  great  fact  woven  deep  into  the 
very  texture  of  Christianity ;  but  there  is  more 
than  that.  About  this  insignificant  person  there 
is  an  attraction  so  powerful  that  it  imposed  a 
law  of  gravitation  upon  Heaven,  and  drew 
Eternal  Love  down  to  itself.  The  hidden  poten- 
tialities of  that  frail,  unsteady,  wayward  human 
heart,  the  unseen  beauty  of  that  warped  and 
blemished  soul,  were  as  fuel  of  fire  to  the  burning 
heart  of  the  Saviour.  He  was  created  for  Jesus, 
predestinated  to  the  splendour  of  the  hidden 
life  in  Christ ;  and  thus  his  weakness  and  need 
knocked  irresistibly  upon  the  door  of  Heaven, 
and  helped"  to  transfigure  the  earth  with  the 
glorious  mystery  of  the  Incarnation.  He  lives 
in  a  redeemed  world.  The  discriminative  love 
of  Jesus  has  flung  its  dewy  splendour  about  his 
sordidness  ;  the  eye  of  Jesus  has  looked  upon 
him  till  his  own  eye  reflects  a  faint  shadow  of 
that  look  ;  the  hand  of  Jesus  has  touched  him 
and  left  a  trail  of  glory  where  it  rested. 

85 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

And  yet  a  third  lustre  wraps  him  round. 
If  Christianity  is  true,  then  the  God  who  so 
wondrously  made  him,  and  who  is  waiting  to 
remake  him  yet  more  wondrously,  has  a  distinct 
intention  and  plan  for  him.  He  has  an  inalien- 
able place  in  the  mighty  purposes  of  Heaven. 
As  an  individual,  a  citizen,  a  member  of  the 
Body  of  Christ,  there  is  a  work  for  him  to  do 
which  no  other  man,  nor  all  men  taken  together, 
can  do.  It  is  his  peculiar  dignity,  his  only 
happiness,  to  give  to  God  a  love  and  a  worship 
which  no  other  can  give  should  he  refuse  it. 
In  creating  him,  God  gave  him  his  own  share 
in  the  eternal  destiny;  who  dare  set  a  limit  to 
the  momentous  interests  extending  far  beyond 
the  scope  of  his  individual  life  which  depend  upon 
his  'free  self-dedication  to  his  Creator  ?  And  as 
on  earth  he  has  his  own  unique  work  and  value 
for  God,  so  he  has  his  own  place  in  the  life  beyond. 
For  him  there  waits,  if  he  be  true  to  his  divine 
calling,  a  crown  of  individual  splendour  and 
characteristic  loveliness,  destined  to  make  its 
own  irreplaceable  contribution  to  the  glory  of  the 
City  of  God.  , 

These  are  tremendous  assumptions,  and  it 
takes  a  tremendous  faith  to  preach  them  ;  yet 
they  belong  to  the  essence  of  the  Christian  Gospel, 
and  to  weaken  them  by  one  iota  is  to  fail  of  our 
trust.  We  are  ashamed  to  think  how  largely 
we  have  failed  in  this  matter.  A  meretricious 
apologetic  and  a  spurious  liberalism— now  finally 

86 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

vanished,  one  would  hope,  in  the  shaking  of  things 
that  can  be  shaken — have  betrayed  us  into  preach- 
ing Christianity  as  if  it  were  merely  a  sympathetic 
and  religious  way  of  expressing  the  moral  and 
social  ideals  of  the  best  thinkers.  But  we  are 
once  more  coming  to  see  that  the  Christian 
Gospel,  while  it  is  the  source  of  all  these  ideals, 
is  something  other  than  they,  and  that  its  great 
differentiating  factor  is  simply  the  love  of  God 
to  men.  The  Christian  doctrine  that  God  loves 
us  and  desires  our  love  is  not  a  figure  of  speech 
— a  romantic  version  of  the  thesis  that  God 
cares  for  the  race,  appreciates  each  individual 
as  a  contributing  factor  in  its  development,  and 
makes  certain  ethical  demands  upon  him.  It 
means  precisely  what  it  says.  It  announces  in 
the  face  of  a  thousand  screaming  contradictions 
that  God  loves  men  and  expects  men  to  believe 
it.  And  once  a  man  does  believe  it,  he  may 
succeed  in  getting  rid  of  the  miraculous,  but  he 
will  not  be  likely  to  object  to  it  on  the  score  of 
its  difficulty.  Beside  the  one  stupendous  doctrine 
of  the  love  of  God  all  other  doctrines  appear 
credible.  What  can  be  more  simple  and  ele- 
mentary, what  more  sublime  and  regenerative, 
than  a  childlike  faith  in  the  loving  fatherhood 
of  God  ?  Yet  the  moment  we  say  the  great 
words,  God  is  love,  with  meaning  and  intensity, 
we  find  ourselves  caught  in  a  grim  conflict  of  soul, 
compared  to  which  our  dogmatic  difficulties  are 
mere  child's-play. 

87 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Here,  then,  is  the  centre,  the  inmost  heart, 
of  the  Christian  conception  of  God.     There  are 
many  forms  of  heterodoxy,  but  there  is  ultimately 
only  one  heresy — the  weakening  or  denial  of  the 
doctrine  of  the  love   of  God.     To  re-think  our 
thought  of  God  must  therefore  mean,  first  and 
foremost,  to  sink  more  deeply  into  that  doctrine, 
and  to  ^realise  more  clearly  its   tremendous  im- 
plications.    What  does  it  mean  in  ihe  light  of 
our  deepest  religious  experience  ?     How  does  it 
present  itself  when  we  have   exercised  our  best 
intelligence  upon  it  ?     How  can  we  best  restate 
it  %in  consonance  with  present-day  needs,  and  in 
forms  most  readily  assimilated  by  the  mind    of 
to-day  ?     This    is   not    an    abstract    intellectual 
exeircise,    but    a    most    uncomfortably    practical 
inquiry.     One  need  not  ponder  this  great  doctrine 
very  long  or  deeply  before  coming  to  the  melan- 
choly conviction  that  the  Church's  corporate  life 
and  organisation  are  not  based  upon  a  profound, 
unequivocal  faith  in  the  love  of  God,  but,  on  the 
contrary,  upon  a  compromise  between  that  doc- 
trine and  the  world's  scale  of  values  which    is 
more  fatal  by  far  than  its  direct  negation.     One 
need  only  think  of  the  fact  that,  as  a  pungent 
critic  phrased  it,  "  there  is  more  grief  in  Church 
circles   over   one  rich  man  that  departeth  than 
over   ninety-and-nine    poor   persons    who   never 
come  near  the  Church,"  in  order  to  realise  the 
force   of  this  assertion.     Nor   need   we   imagine 
that   the  preaching    of   what    is   called   a   social 

88 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

doctrine  will  mend  matters.  The  social  doctrine 
promulgated  by  Trades  Unionists  is  sufficiently 
democratic  ;  yet  Trades  Unions,  as  one  knows 
them,  are  not  one  whit  ahead  of  the  Churches 
in  adopting  a  hospitable  and  understanding  atti- 
tude towards  the  classes  not  included  in  their 
membership,  whether  it  be  the  capitalist  class 
or  the  ranks  of  casual  labour.  If  the  truth  were 
told,  they  are  several  degrees  more  class-con- 
scious and  exclusive  than  even  the  most  com- 
placent Churches.  There  is  only  one  thing  that 
can  save  the  Church  of  Christ  from  its  entangle- 
ment with  anti-social  interests — a  new  thought 
of  God  as  loving  men  with  a  love  so  individual 
and  compassionate  that  beside  it  a  mother's  love 
shows  rough  edges,  and  so  exacting  that  the 
meticulous  discipline  of  Christian  monk  or  Hindu 
ascetic  seems  poor  and  trivial  beside  the  strength 
of  its  consuming  fire,  the  rigour  of  its  inexorable 
inquisition.  To  think  through  this  conception 
till  its  remotest  implications  become  apparent 
and  compelling  is  the  Christian  teacher's  first 
duty. 


Ill 

To  say  that  our  supreme  need  is  to  think  of  God 
in  terms  of  Jesus  Christ  and  His  Cross  is  to  utter 
one  of  those  commonplaces  of  Christian  teaching 
which  we  took  for  granted,  until  the  war  revealed 
the  fact  that  it  had  never  been  really  accepted 

89 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

by  the  great  mass  of  Christian  people.  When 
anguished  souls  cried  out  that  they  could  no  longer 
believe  in  a  God  who  permits  such  a  hell  of  cruelty 
and  slaughter,  they  were  implying  a  doctrine, of 
the  Divine  Omnipotence  expressed  in  terms  of 
nature  and  brute  force,  not  in  terms  of  love  and 
grace.  The  popular  doctrine  of  God  is  theistic 
(where  it  is  not  crassly  deistic)  rather  than 
Christian  ;  it  does  not  go  to  Jesus  for  its  definition 
of  omnipotence.  The  average  man,  even  where 
he  refuses  to  admit  it,  conceives  of  the  Incarnation 
as  a  suspension  of  God's  omnipotence  in  favour 
of  His  love.  He  believes  in  the  omnipotence  of 
love  on  the  human  plane,  and  after  a  sentimental 
fashion.  He  believes  it  may  triumph  in  the 
realm  of  family  affection,  but  cannot  conceive 
of  its  application  to  the  life  of  nations.  He 
admits  it  to  be  the  strength  of  a  mother's  heart, 
but  assumes  it  to  be  something  of  an  amiable 
weakness  in  God.  He  has  yet  to  learn  that  the 
only  doctrine  of  God's  omnipotence  that  is  tenable 
in  face  of  life's  grim  realities  finds  expression  in 
Christ.  In  Him  we  see  God  giving  up  His  well- 
beloved  Son  to  a  life  of  suffering  and  a  death  of 
shame,  not  in  spite  of  His  omnipotence,  but 
because  He  is  omnipotent  with  the  omnipotence 
of  love  that  can  suffer  to  the  death  and  still 
remain  love.  His  is  an  omnipotence  that  triumphs 
in  endurance,  subjugates  men  by  suffering  dumbly 
at  their  hands,  and  delivers  its  own  by  sharing 
their  afflictions.     How  many  of  the  distracting 

90 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

doubts  born  of  a  desperate  world-situation  would 
survive  if  we  denned  the  power  of  God  in 
terms  of  Jesus  ?  It  is  surely  significant  that, 
with  the  exception  of  one  brilliant  attempt,*  re- 
cent theological  thought  has  given  us  little  help 
towards  the  restatement  of  the  Christian  doctrine 
of  Divine  Omnipotence,  and  popular  preaching 
still  largely  proceeds  upon  a  conception  of  God's 
power  which  defines  it  in  terms  of  material  force 
plus  will,  making  His  love  a  separable  addendum 
to  it  instead  of  its  very  essence. 

But  to  re-think  our  thought  of  God  in  terms 
of  Jesus  Christ  means  to  re-think  it  in  terms  of 
the  Cross.  It  is  one  of  the  most  hopeful  signs 
of  the  times  that  we  are  at  last  realising  that 
the  reality  of  the  Cross  does  not  stand  or  fall 
with  any  given  theology ;  that  neither  evangelical 
sentimentalities,  nor  modernist  evaporations, 
nor  forensic  ossifications  can  avail  to  blunt  its 
challenge  or  weaken  its  attraction.  When  they 
have  spoken  their  last  word,  the  Cross  still  waits 
at  the  turning-point  of  man's  pilgrimage.  All 
ways  of  approach  lead  to  it ;  all  lines  of  argu- 
ment converge  upon  it ;  every  deep  instinct  of 
the  soul  is  drawn  to  it.  Theologies  may  change 
and  institutions  perish,  but  still  mankind  will 
survey  the  wondrous  Cross  on  which  the  Prince 
of  Glory  died.  Coarse  and  mechanical  theories 
of  the  Atonement  may  for  a  time  alienate  sincere 
and  sensitive  souls ;    but  in  breaking  loose  from 

*  "  The  World's  Redemption,"  by  C.  E.  Rolt. 
91 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

crude  theories  they  do  not  leave  the  Cross  behind 
them,  for  the  Cross  is  stamped  upon  all  art  and 
literature,  all  thought  and  life.  When  Roman 
soldiers  cast  lots  for  the  garments  of  the  Crucified, 
they  little  dreamt  that  a  whole  world  would 
clothe  its  nakedness  with  these  blood-stained 
folds.  If  we  turn  our  backs  on  Calvary,  it  is 
only  to  find  the  Cross  again  in  "  Mr.  Britling's'' 
Essex  villa,  among  Dostoievsky's  Russian  pris- 
oners, in  the  pages  of  the  Referee.  If  we  refuse 
to  see  it  in  the  Mission-field,  it  meets  us  in  the 
first  selfless  life  we  touch.  As  well  try  to  run 
away  from  the  law  of  gravitation  !  "  The  Cross 
is  such  a  thing,"  the  late  Dr.  Denney  once 
remarked,  "  that  even  if  you  bury  it,  you  bury 
it  alive."  * 

To  stand  at  the  foot  of  the  Cross,  forgetting 
the  controversies  that  have  gathered  about  it 
in  the  past  and  thinking  only  of  its  vital  mean- 
ing for  us  to-day,  is  to  realise  the  falseness  and 
shallowness  of  our  conception  of  God,  and  to 
come  nearer  the  core  of  reality  than  our  recal- 
citrant souls  can  bear  with  comfort.  In  our 
fretting  perplexity  regarding  the  ways  of  God 
with  men  during  the  Great  War,  we  were  apt  to 
console  ourselves  with  the  reflection  that  "  the 
world's  history  is  the  world's  judgment,"  and 
that  in  the  long  run  goodness  must  have  its 
reward  and  wickedness  be  cursed   with  defeat. 

*  T.  H.  Walker,  "  Principal  James  Denney :  A  Memoir  and 
a  Tribute,"  p.  72. 

92 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

But  a  look  at  the  Cross  suffices  to  dispel  that 
easy  confidence.  The  Cross  also  says  that  good- 
ness must  triumph  in  the  long  run ;  but  it  speaks 
with  an  accent  that  shows  its  seeming  corrob- 
oration of  our  facile  optimism  to  be  in  reality 
a  shattering  contradiction.  Its  "  long  run  "  is 
a  very  long  run  indeed — so  long  that  the  hearts 
of  many  will  wax  cold.  It  speaks  of  a  Love  that 
must  conquer,  a  Justice  that  must  prevail ;  but 
it  is  a  Love  that  can  see  its  best-beloved  delivered 
to  torture  and  not  raise  a  hand  to  save  him,  a 
Justice  that  can  see  injustice  flaunt  its  shameless 
victory  in  the  market-place  and  keep  silent. 
It  gives  us,  in  short,  a  new  conception  of  the 
omnipotence  of  God.  We  asked  Him  in  bitter 
perplexity  why  He  allowed  the  earth  to  be  filled 
with  cruelty,  why  a  brutalised  nation  should 
be  suffered  to  wreak  its  lusts  upon  the  innocent 
and  the  chivalrous  ;  and  so  long  as  we  think  of 
God  as  an  omnipotent  Being  who  is  also  supposed 
to  be  Love,  we  shall  continue  to  ask  these  questions 
with  despairing  vehemence  and  find  no  answer 
to  the  cry  of  our  souls.  But  in  face  of  the  God 
of  Jesus  crucified,  they  die  upon  our  lips.  We 
know  the  answer  before  we  ask  them.  It  is  : 
"  When  did  I  promise  to  give  My  servants  such 
a  victory  as  you  are  thinking  of,  or  to  stay  brute 
force  lest  these  I  love  best  are  hurt  ?  Not  when 
I  gave  My  beloved  Son  to  defeat  and  death  and 
kept  My  sword  in  its  sheath." 

The  Cross  does  not  belittle  our  perplexities  ; 

93 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

it  shifts  their  centre  of  gravity  to  a  profounder 
depth.  In  the  light  of  its  stern  logic  they  appear 
shallow  and  trivial.  It  meets  them,  not  with  an 
answer,  but  with  a  counter-challenge,  matching 
the  paradox  of  human  suffering  with  the  greater 
paradox  of  a  Love  that  is  an  inexorable  exaction, 
and  a  Justice  whose  sword-edge  is  a  terrible 
power  of  mute  endurance.  "  Can  you  venture 
upon  the  depths  of  such  Love  ?  "  asks  the  God 
of  Jesus.  "  Can  you  take  the  Cross  seriously, 
and  still  keep  an  unshaken  hope  in  your  heart — 
the  hope  that  lives  not  only  through  but  by 
disappointment  ?  "  And  to  accept  that  challenge 
is  to  be  born  into  a  new  world  and  to  possess 
a  new  scale  of  values.  To  have  truly  seen  the 
Cross  and  still  to  think  of  serving  God  for  any 
reward  but  the  Love  that  cannot  spare  us,  is  an 
incurable  moral  stupidity.  Rather  than  con- 
tinue to  worship  a  Deity  who  pays  His  servants 
in  material  coin,  would  we  cry  out,  in  face  of 
the  bitter  agony  of  Him  who  always  did  the 
Father's  will,  that  it  is  a  terrible  and  cruel  thing 
to  be  loved  of  God.  There  is  a  deeper  sanity 
in  that  cry  of  revolt  than  in  a  conception  of  the 
Divine  Omnipotence  which  would  make  us  pro- 
nounce the  Cross  an  outrage  upon  the  universe, 
had  we  but  the  courage  to  follow  our  conventional 
beliefs  to  their  logical  conclusion. 

For  if  the  Cross  means  anything  at  all,  it 
means  that  the  one  Man  who  dared  to  be  utterly 
good  and  to  take  the  full  consequences  of  good- 

94 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

ness  found  no  room  in  the  world.  The  malignity 
of  religious  and  national  leaders,  the  obtuseness 
of  a  mob  that  howled  with  the  conquering  party, 
and  the  tragic  zeal  of  good  men  who  failed  to 
recognise  goodness  when  they  saw  it,  conspired 
to  nail  Him  to  the  Cross.  It  means  that  the 
world  that  had  produced  Plato,  the  nation  whose 
ear  was  attuned  to  the  sublime  cadence  of  the 
prophetic  word,  was  so  exasperated  at  the  sight 
of  perfect  goodness,  so  enraged  in  the  presence 
of  utter  truth,  that  it  could  not  tolerate  the  Man 
in  whom  they  were  incarnate ;  it  had  no  rest 
till  it  had  done  away  with  Him.  And  if  goodness 
and  truth  meet  with  a  gentler  reception  in  the 
world  to-day,  it  is  because  Jesus  has  lived  and 
died,  because  He  has  called  to  Himself  out  of 
the  world  those  who  were  willing  to  be  crucified 
with  Him.  Empty  the  Cross  of  all  its  theo- 
logical meaning,  and  still  it  stands  as  an  irre- 
ducible offence  to  our  natural  faith  in  mankind, 
our  fond  belief  that  the  majority  is  always  right. 
The  man  who  looks  at  the  Cross  fairly  and  squarely, 
though  he  have  given  up  all  dogmatic  presup- 
positions, will  find  it  impossible  thereafter  to 
say,  Vox  populi,  vox  Dei,  or  to  trust  that  "  mixed 
multitude  "  which  makes  up  his  own  strangely 
composite  and  treacherous  heart.  To  the  mind 
that  faces  it  honestly,  Christianity  is  sown  with 
paradox  and  collision.  It  is  at  once  peace  and 
a  sword,  healing  and  wounds,  salvation  and 
condemnation.     It  cannot  be  neglected  without 

95 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

irreparable  loss  ;  it  cannot  be  accepted  without 
leaving  indelible  scars.  It  is  God  meeting  man ; 
and  what  can  rob  that  meeting  of  its  holy  terror 
and  its  healing  sting  ? 

And  the  Cross  does  not  stand  alone.  In  its 
wake  follows  the  Church.  According  to  our  old 
thought  of  God,  the  history  of  the  Church  should 
have  been  one  long  triumphal  march,  with  the 
seal  of  sanctity  so  clearly  stamped  on  the  victors' 
brow  that  even  Christ's  enemies  could  not  but 
fall  back  silenced  and  overawed.  But  instead 
we  have  an  advance  so  slow  and  broken  that  it 
seems  a  retrogression,  a  record  stained  by  un- 
worthy omissions,  disintegrating  fanaticisms,  long, 
dull  periods  of  indifference,  tragic  relapses  into 
worldliness  and  vice.  Says  Dora  Greenwell,  in 
words  that  seem  to  drop  like  molten  lead  upon 
the  current  sentiment  which  takes  it  for  granted 
that  the  earthly  defeat  of  truth  and  honour  is 
a  stain  on  the  Divine  escutcheon  : — 

What  olden  Saga  is  so  dark,  so  sorrowful,  so  tracked 
by  error,  so  stained  with  crime,  as  is  the  history  of  the 
Christian  Church  ?  Her  attitude  is  one  of  unceasing 
antagonism  with  the  great  forces  of  nature  which  sur- 
round her ;  at  once  oppressed  and  an  oppressor,  a 
sufferer  and  one  who  causes  woe,  she  can  only  triumph 
at  a  mighty  cost ;  so  that  she  seems,-  in  Lacordaire's 
energetic  words,  to  be  "  born  crucified  " — appointed  to 
a  foreseen  death  !  Christ  is  a  conqueror  whose  victories 
have  been  always  won  through  loss  and  humiliation. 
His  battle-flag,  like  that  of  Sigurd,  while  it  has  ensured 

96 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

triumph  to  those  who  followed  it,  has  brought  "destruc- 
tion to  him  who  carried  it.* 

The  history  of  the  Church  can  only  be  ex- 
plained by  the  Cross — a  key  which,  like  that  of 
Bunyan's  pilgrim,  "  grates  hard  in  the  lock." 
On  the  facile  theory  of  a  God  who  gives  swift  and 
palpable  victory  to  His  cause,  it  offers  as  grim  a 
problem  to  faith  as  any  created  by  the  war. 
On  such  a  theory,  the  only  logical  conclusion 
regarding  the  Church  as  well  as  the  Empire  would 
be  that  flung  out  by  Mr.  William  Watson  in  his 
years  of  revolt  : — 

Best  by  remembering  God,  say  some, 
We  keep  our  high  imperial  lot. 

Fortune,  I  fear,  hath  oftenest  come 
When  we  forgot — when  we  forgot ! 

A  lovelier  faith  their  happier  crown, 

But  history  laughs  and  weeps  it  down. 

Yet  the  final  word  of  the  Cross  is  not  defeat 
but  victory.  It  speaks  of  that  victory  which 
God  has  promised  to  His  own.  It  tells  us  that 
when  God  wished,  not  to  humiliate,  but  to  glorify 
His  Son  in  the  sight  of  all  men,  He  sent  Him  to 
defeat  and  death  ;  but  that  defeat  was  the 
victory,  and  in  that  death,  death  was  abolished. 
For  on  the  Cross  an  evil  world  was  judged  and 
doomed  at  the  very  moment  of  its  triumph.  The 
world  offered  tempting  alternatives  to  Jesus,  and 
He    showed     what     He    thought    of     them    by 

*  "  Colloquia  Crucis,"  p.  98, 
H  97 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

deliberately  choosing  the  Cross.  The  flesh,  and 
especially  the  carnal  mind  that  ever  clothes  itself 
in  the  trappings  of  a  superior  spirituality,  did 
its  best  to  confuse  and  corrupt  His  judgments. 
He  condemned  it  once  and  for  all  by  nailing  it 
to  the  Cross.  The  powers  of  darkness  flattered 
and  threatened  Him  by  turns.  He  preferred 
the  weakness  and  dereliction  of  the  Cross  to  the 
empire  they  promised  Him,  and  so  judged  the 
Prince  of  this  world.  It  is  easy  to  see  in  the 
Cross  a  defeat  borne  willingly  by  our  Lord  for 
us  ;  to  see  in  it  a  victory  is  to  have  a  new  thought 
of  God. 

Nor  is  the  victory  of  the  Cross  a  victory  of 
non-resistance.  Christ  died  a  militant ;  He  died 
fighting.  He  was  never  faced  with  an  alternative 
such  as  confronts  the  pacifist.  For  Him  physical 
resistance  to  a  hostile  national  party  that  had 
arrayed  the  whole  machinery  of  the  law  against 
Him  was  out  of  the  question,*  unless  He  con- 
descended to  the  demagogic  methods  of  false 
messiahs  and  incited  an  impressionable  rabble 
to  defy  the  powers  that  be — a  course  which  not 
the  most  rabid  militant  deems  worthy  of  any 
noble  man,  let  alone  of  the  Perfect  Man.  Only 
one  kind  of  resistance  was  open  to  Christ ;  and 
that  He  chose  whole-heartedly.  His  course  was 
to  endure,  and  to  judge  His  enemies  in  enduring. 

• '  *  Unless  the  reference  to  "  legions  of  angels  "  in  Matt.  xxvi. 
53,  be  taken  to  imply  the  possibility  of  physical  resistance — an 
interpretation  few  students  would  venture  upon. 

9? 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

No  one  can  read  the  account  of  the  trial  of  Jesus 
without  realising  how  implacable  was  His  soul's 
resistance  against  the  moral  stupidity  and  mean 
malignity  that  had  brought  Him  before  His 
judges.  And  in  that  so  terrible  because  so 
meek  resistance  the  very  nature  of  God  is  mir- 
rored. As  Christ's  enemies  set  the  laws  to  which 
His  country  was  subject  in  motion  against  Him, 
so  man  in  sinning  has,  as  it  were,  confronted 
God  with  His  own  immutable  law,  the  law  of 
freedom  graven  deep  in  the  nature  of  both  God 
and  man.  He  has,  as  it  were,  "  cornered  "  his 
Creator,  tied  the  hands  of  Omnipotence,  said  to 
Him  in  whose  image  He  was  made,  "  You  created 
me  free  :  you  cannot  compel  me  to  be  good,  or 
keep  me  from  being  wicked  by  force."  And 
God's  answer  is  an  endurance  which  is  at  once 
a  tender  pleading  and  a  formidable  antagonism. 
He  is  not  only  our  Saviour,  but  also  our  Adversary  ; 
and  never  more  our  Saviour  than  when  He  is 
our  Adversary.  He  resists  us  unto  blood,  whet- 
ting His  sword  first  on  His  own  bosom  and  so 
giving  it  its  sharpest  edge.  He  is  that  Man 
who  wrestles  with  us  until  the  breaking  of  the 
day.  "  Awake,  O  sword,  against  My  Shepherd, 
and  against  the  man  that  is  My  fellow,  saith  the 
Lord  of  Hosts."  We  never  realise  the  smiting 
force  of  His  resistance  until  we  see  Him  in  Jesus 
enduring  the  contradiction  of  sinners,  dumb  as 
a  sheep  before  its  shearers,  obedient  unto  the 
death    of    the    Cross.     In    that    terrible,    meek 

99. 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

silence  we  hear  the  thunder  of  doom  as  we  cannot 
hear  it  in  the  clash  and  clamour  of  wrath.  As 
we  stand  face  to  face  with  the  Christ  suffering 
in  silence,  suffering  in  unalterable  love,  there 
comes  to  us  a  revelation  of  Love  omnipotent 
which  makes  it  at  once  the  sweetest  and  the 
most  relentless  thing  in  the  universe  ;  at  once 
a  dove  and  a  sword,  a  healing  dew  and  a  blasting 
tempest.  It  is  as  we  recognise  and  experience 
these  dread  antinomies  that  we  gain  a  new  con- 
ception of  God. 

IV 

Our  attempts  to  explore  that  conception  must 
begin  with  a  new  study  of  the  Gospels,  and 
indeed  of  the  whole  New  Testament.  It  is 
significant  that  the  flood  of  light  which  recent 
scholarship  has  poured  in  upon  the  New  Testa- 
ment has  been  so  scantily  utilised  by  the  man  of 
vision,  who  can  seize  the  throbbing  heart  of  a 
book  and  make  it  live  for  this  generation.  We 
have  to  a  large  extent  popularised  the  processes 
and  results  of  criticism,  and  are  familiar  with  a 
style  of  preaching  which  is,  in  effect,  little  else 
than  diluted  Old  or  New  Testament  Introduction. 
But  these  processes  and  results,  however  valid, 
remain  little  more  than  the  professional  occu- 
pation of  a  few  experts,  unless  the  light  they 
bring  is  used  to  reveal  the  very  heart  of  Scripture 
making  it  a  new  book  for  both    preacher    and 


Tfie  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

hearer.  True,  scholarly  research  should  have 
no  homiletical  axe  to  grind,  and  the  Biblical 
expert  who  has  an  eye  to  the  "  preachable  "  is 
not  greatly  to  be  trusted  either  as  an  expert 
or  as  a  spiritual  guide.  But  it  is  equally  true 
that  the  preacher  to  whom  the  scholar's  work 
is  a  pure  piece  of  technical  exposition,  in  whom 
the  vast  contribution  of  critical  research  to  our 
understanding  of  the  background  of  the  Gospels, 
the  setting  of  the  Pauline  Epistles,  and  the  genius 
of  New  Testament  Greek  does  not  breed  a  surer 
grasp,  a  larger  vision,  a  more  potent  skill  of  inter- 
pretation, has  failed  to  realise  the  greatness  of 
his  calling.  Nothing  could  be  of  more  evil  omen 
for  the  future  of  the  Church  than  the  existence 
of  a  large  body  of  critical  work  that  has  not 
passed  from  the  scholar's  workshop  into  the 
very  fibre  of  the  exegete,  the  expositor,  and  the 
preacher.  All  genuine  critical  scholarship  has 
a  spiritual  goal.  It  only  needs  the  man  of  insight 
and  vision  to  transmute  it  to  a  force  which  re- 
claims and  re-creates  great  tracts  of  Scripture 
for  our  age. 

To-day  it  is  the  Old  rather  than  the  New 
Testament  that  attracts  preacher  and  hearer. 
The  war  has  flung  us  back  into  an  Old  Testament 
atmosphere.  Once  more  the  cry  of  the  hard- 
pressed,  hunted  soul  that  echoes  through  the 
Book  of  Psalms,  the  passionate  appeal  to  a  God 
who  will  judge  and  avenge,  the  solemn  impreca- 
tions   and    triumphant    hymns    of    a    theocratic 

IOI 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

patriotism  waken  deep  chords  in  the  soul.  An 
intensified  national  consciousness  finds  support 
and  religious  sanction  in  the  history  of  Israel, 
and  the  sense  of  a  grim  struggle  for  truth  and 
righteousness  sees  its  vindication  in  the  God  of 
battles  who  fights  for  those  who  defend  His  cause. 
Popular  preaching,  and  not  a  little  of  our  religious 
war  literature,  reflects  and  furthers  this  reversion 
to  Old  Testament  ideals  ;  and  the  result  is  not 
to  our  highest  spiritual  advantage.  If  ever  there 
was  a  time  when  we  needed  to  bring  all  thought 
and  emotion  to  the  test  of  the  perfect  revelation 
of  God  in  Christ  Jesus,  and  not  to  allow  ourselves 
to  hark  back  to  earlier  stages  of  religious  develop- 
ment, however  we  may  be  tempted  to  do  so  by 
the  exigencies  of  an  unparalleled  situation  in 
the  world  of  moral  feeling,  it  is  surely  to-da}^. 

Already,  indeed,  many  are  turning  away  from 
a  type  of  teaching  which  fosters  hardness  without 
any  real  strength,  and,  while  stimulating  righteous 
indignation,  also  tends  to  increase  that  element 
of  suspicion  and  fear  which  makes  even  justifiable 
hatred  so  dangerous  and  weakening.  Professor 
W.  A.  Curtis  sees  in  this  reaction  the  beginning 
of  a  genuine  return  to  the  New  Testament  : — 

I  have  faith  that  the  neglected  Book  will  find 
interpreters,  will  reassert  its  old  mastery  over  the 
human  heart,  will  cool  the  passions  of  a  grossly  am- 
bitious generation,  will  steal  into  distracted  minds  with 
the   winsome    persuasiveness   which   lent   it   its   former 

102 


The  Need  for  a  New  Thought  of  God 

influence.  If  the  nations  are  living  upon  an  inter- 
national level  which  is  Old  Testament  rather  than  New 
Testament  in  its  spirit,  it  may  be  that  they  are  being 
prepared  through  the  bitter  experience  of  war  and  jealousy 
and  hatred  to  look  with  an  Old  Testament  wistfulness 
towards  a  New  Era  of  peace  and  good  will  established 
on  more  secure  foundations.  Even  now,  though  we 
sing  the  Psalms  with  a  new  appreciation  of  their  fitness 
to  our  case,  it  is  to  the  New  Testament  that  we  turn 
for  admission  to  a  higher  hope  and  a  heavenly  atmo- 
sphere. It  is  the  New  Testament  that  our  brave  men 
carry  in  their  reduced  kits,  the  one  article  in  their  outfit 
which  lightens  their  campaigning  load.  It  is  the  New 
Testament  that  will  hold  up  before  statesmen  and  diplo- 
mats and  potentates  a  vision  of  another  world  than  that 
which  they  control.* 

A  return  to  the  New  Testament,  and  especially 
to  the  Gospels,  in  order  to  elicit  for  ourselves 
and  for  our  time  its  inmost  meaning  and  spirit,  is 
the  first  step  towards  recovering  that  specifically 
Christian  conception  of  God  for  want  of  which 
our  life  trails  a  broken  wing.  That  conception 
as  it  unfolds  itself  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus, 
authenticates  itself  in  His  life  and  gains  world- 
wide redemptive  sweep  in  His  death,  is  the 
supreme  treasure  of  mankind.  From  it  all  per- 
sonal holiness  and  all  communal  righteousness 
proceed.  It  is  the  animating  impulse  of  all 
fruitful  thinking  and  beautiful  living.  By  it 
all  great  art  is  nourished  ;    out  of  it  are  born  all 

*  The  Expositor,  January,   191 6. 
103 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

true  philanthropy  and  social  reform.  To  appro- 
priate it  as  reflected  in  our  present  experience 
and  seen  in  the  light  of  present  vision,  and  to 
show  it  forth  to  the  world  in  all  its  constraining 
beauty  and  purging  severity,  is  to  make  a  con- 
tribution to  the  age  beside  which  all  the  national 
effort  that  has  made  these  dark  days  glorious  is 
a  small  thing  in  comparison. 


04 


CHAPTER    V 

THE    HIGHWAY    OF   THE   CROSS 

In  spite  of  all  that  has  been  done  in  the  interests 
of  a  supposedly  liberal  and  enlightened  Chris- 
tianity to  eliminate  the  Cross,  or  at  least  to  make 
it  of  none  effect,  the  deep,  ineradicable  instinct 
of  the  Christian  heart  insists  against  all  argu- 
ments to  the  contrary  upon  making  it  the  centre 
of  its  faith.  It  is  the  Cross  that  makes  the 
Christian,  the  Cross  that  makes  the  saint.  So 
far  from  being  one  of  those  dogmatic  encum- 
brances that  have  gathered  about  Christianity 
as  separable  accretions,  it  is  its  vital  principle. 
That  we  do  not  realise  this  sufficiently  is  due  to 
our  almost  ludicrous  deference  to  outside  pro- 
nouncements upon  Christianity,  especially  when 
they  happen  to  come  from  prominent  scientists, 
philosophers,  or  litterateurs.  So  long  as  we  con- 
tinue to  be  unduly  depressed  when  a  President 
of  the  British  Association  takes  a  materialistic 
point  of  view,  and  almost  indecently  elated  when 
he  argues  for  a  spiritual  universe,  we  have  failed 
to  discern  what  is  essential  in  Christianity.  It 
is  characteristic  of  Christianity,  as  it  is  character- 
istic of  every  religion  which  involves  a  vital 
experience,  that  the  things  that  can  be  "  proved," 

*°5 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

or  corroborated  by  the  opinion  of  spectators, 
whatever  be  their  intellectual  prestige,  who  do 
not  share  that  experience,  are  not  the  things  that 
belong  to  its  vital  essence.  The  essentials  of 
religion  cannot  be  demonstrated  in  this  second- 
hand way.  Their  secret  lies  in  the  bosom  of 
those  who  have  verified  them  in  terms  of  life  ; 
their  witness  is  inward.  Evidence  is  to  be  treated 
with  due  respect,  and  one  cannot  sufficiently 
deprecate  the  old-time  narrowness  and  arrogance 
which  ruled  out  of  court  the  testimony  of  every- 
one who  did  not  happen  to  be  a  professing  Chris- 
tian. But  none  the  less  it  remains  true  that 
evidence  of  this  external  kind  is  just — evidence, 
and  therefore  utterly  inadequate  to  prove  the 
things  most  worth  proving.  It  is  collateral, 
not  central ;  it  strengthens  proof,  but  does  not 
supply  it.  To  come  to  close  quarters  with  the 
vital  things  of  Christianity  we  need  the  testimony 
of  the  Christian  soul ;  and  that  testimony  is 
something  far  greater  than  mere  evidence  ;  it 
is  the  witness  of  life.  And  as  we  scrutinise  that 
life — not  as  curious  anatomisers,  but  as  open- 
minded  inquirers — we  shall  find  the  mark  of  the 
Cross  inwoven  into  its  very  fibre. 

•     I 

Whenever  some  great  calamity  or  upheaval 
strips  life  of  its  disguises,  true-hearted  men  are 
drawn    to    the    long-neglected    Cross.     Chaplains 

106 


The  Highway  of  the  Cross 

and  others  who  have  come  upon  soldiers  pausing 
before  a  French  wayside  Calvary  have  been 
struck  by  the  look  of  half-bashful  yet  indubitable 
recognition  in  the  eyes  of  some  of  these  men. 
"  I  understand  at  last/'  these  eyes  seem  to  say, 
"  I  can't  put  it  into  words,  but  I  understand." 
One  wonders  if  we  fully  realise  the  significance 
of  that  new  understanding  ;  the  prevailing  tone 
of  recent  religious  literature  does  not  convey  that 
impression.  In  that  literature  we  are  told  again 
and  again  that  Christianity,  so  far  from  being  "  a 
subterranean  conspiracy  against  life/'  is  a  glorious 
adventure,  a  voyage  of  discovery  that  sets  a 
man's  blood  tingling.  We  are  reminded  how 
our  brave  boys  took  death  in  their  stride,  as  it 
were — calmly,  simply,  merrily  even,  without  sickly 
reflection  or  regret,  but  rather  as  that  which 
gives  life  its  bracing  salt  sting,  its  imperishable 
glory.  They  looked  into  the  bright  eyes  of 
danger  and  read  the  secret  of  life  there.  To 
despise  security  and  hug  risk  to  one's  bosom, 
not  to  worry,  not  to  think  about  oneself  at  all, 
but  to  "  do  one's  bit,"  with  the  green  fields  of  Eng- 
land set  deep  in  one's  heart  and  the  vision  of  a 
new  world  somewhere  at  the  back  of  one's 
mind — that  is  a  man's  life,  they  would  say,  could 
they  put  their  souls  into  words.  And  what  is 
such  a  life,  we  are  asked,  but  a  following  of  the 
great  Adventurer,  who  also  met  death  early, 
met  it  for  a  world  of  men,  met  it  without  a  thought 
of  self  ?     Says  a  writer  of  verse,   appealing   to 

107 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

the  clergy  to  give  a  simple,  vital  Christian  message 
to  our  men  at  the  Front  and  in  hospital : — 

And  tell  him  that  when,  calling  on  his  pride, 

He  faced  the  vilest  trenches  with  a  jest, 
That  when  he,  crushing  natural  fear  aside, 

Went  over,  resolute  to  do  his  best, 
That  when  he  bore,  albeit  with  anguished  face, 

His  pain  in  silence,  nor  reviled  thereat, 
He  was  vas  Christ  Himself  for  each  brief  space, 

vSince  Christ   Himself  could  scarce  have  bettered 
that ! * 

"  Christ  Himself  could  scarce  have  bettered 
that !  "  The  sentiment  is  natural  to  hearts  bowed 
down  and  thrilled  by  the  sacrifice  of  those  who 
stand  between  us  and  the  enemy.  To  what 
can  it  be  compared,  except  to  the  supreme  Sacri- 
fice on  Calvary  ?  What  more  could  Christ  have 
done,  had  He  stood  in  these  men's  place  ?  Yes, 
it  is  entirely  natural  that  generous  hearts,  ac- 
tuated by  a  genuine  religious  impulse,  should 
exclaim  that  Christ  Himself  could  scarce  have 
bettered  that.  And  yet  that  sentiment  has  no 
foundation  in  reality.  It  rests  upon  a  pathetic 
blindness  to  the  deepest  meaning  of  the  Cross. 
If  Christ  had  not  infinitely  bettered  that,  the 
sacrifice  of  these  lads  would  have  been  emptied 
of  its  noblest  significance.  If  Calvary,  while  it 
included  their  sacrifice,  were  not  a  fact  so  unique 
that  a  comparison  with  any  lesser  sacrifice  is  an 

*  Captain  R.  S.  T.  Cochrane,  in  Country  Life. 
108 


The  Highway  of  the  Cross 

utter  impertinence,  it  could  not  have  refined 
and  transformed  the  suffering  of  our  men  to 
the  high  and  holy  heroism  which  marked  the 
noblest  souls  among  them.  They  did  so  sur- 
passingly well  just  because  Christ  had  done  so 
incomparably  better. 

For  while  Christianity  is  indeed  a  great 
adventure,  a  life  of  splendid  daring  and  joyous 
risk,  it  is  an  adventure  with  a  difference.  The 
New  Testament  thrills  with  the  joy  of  explora- 
tion, and  flings  a  stinging  challenge  to  tameness 
and  mediocrity ;  yet  adventure  is  not  its  last 
word.  The  adventurer  and  knight-errant  of  faith 
is  an  investor.  He  does  great  business  in  the 
high  market  of  chivalry,  risking  much  that  he 
may  gain  more.  But  the  Christian  life  at  its 
deepest  is  not  an  investment,  however  noble  be 
the  market.  It  is  a  sacrifice,  and  a  sacrifice 
in  which  not  life's  meannesses  and  cowardice, 
but  life's  wealth  and  splendour,  are  made  to  pass 
through  the  fire.  It  means  the  staking  of  all 
without  any  hope  of  gain  ;  the  "  laying  in  dust 
of  life's  glory,"  with  only  the  love  that  prompted 
the  surrender  to  uphold  the  quivering  spirit ; 
the  mortification  of  self,  not  with  a  view  to 
ultimate  self-enlargement,  but  out  of  pure,  un- 
calculating  devotion  to  the  claims  of  Divine 
Love.  Its  source  is  not  the  romantic  cross  of 
chivalry,  but  the  wondrous  Cross  of  Redemption. 

A  writer  in  one  of  our  religious  journals 
recently  expressed  his  misgiving  as  to  the  prob^ 

109 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

able  effect  upon  our  soldiers  of  the  many  crucifixes 
that  stud  the  waysides  of  France.  He  feared 
they  tended  to  give  them  a  wrong  idea  of  Chris- 
tianity as  a  religion  of  defeat  rather  than  of 
victory.  This  misgiving  embodies  the  central 
fallacy  which  is  sapping  the  life  out  of  our  re- 
ligion. If  the  Gospel  is  true,  then  Christ  con- 
quered on  the  Cross  and  reigns  from  the  Tree. 
If  the  world  has  indeed  been  judged  by  the  Cross, 
then  its  estimates  of  defeat  and  victory  have  been 
reversed  for  ever.  It  is  the  function  of  the  Cross 
to  show  us  where  defeat  lies,  and  where  victory  ; 
and  to  adopt  a  timid,  apologetic  attitude  which 
fastens  upon  the  conception  of  a  risen  and  glorified 
Conqueror  as  less  likely  to  antagonise  <(  the  man 
in  the  street,"  is  to  barter  our  eternal  triumph 
for  a  cheap  effect.  It  is  quite  easy  to  impress 
"  the  man  in  the  street  •'  with  the  figure  of  a 
Divine  Warrior-King  riding  forth  conquering  and 
to  conquer.  The  world  never  finds  it  difficult 
to  take  off  its  hat  to  success.  But  our  mission 
is  not  to  impress  men  ;  it  is  to  subdue  them  by 
the  mighty  weakness  of  the  Cross.  It  is  not  the 
lifted  hat  we  seek,  but  the  bended  knee. 

How  is  it  that  we  who  bear  the  name  of 
Christ  are  so  slow  in  learning  that  there  is  nothing 
mightier,  nothing  more  irresistibly  triumphant, 
than  truth  beaten  to  earth  by  brute  force  ? 
In  this  day  of  ours,  when  mere  physical  power 
looms  so  deceptively  before  even  Christian 
eyes,  it    is   ours    to    confront    the  world  with  a 

JIO 


The  Highway  of  the  Cross 

Crucified  Redeemer.  It  is  doing  the  men  who  have 
fought  for  us  a  grave  injustice  to  imagine  that 
they  are  too  dull  and  coarse  to  appreciate  the 
beauty  and  wonder  of  the  Cross  ;  that  the  figure 
of  the  world's  Redeemer  racked  in  helpless  agony 
must  inspire  them  with  aversion  to,  if  not  con- 
tempt for,  a  religion  whose  symbol  is  the  sign 
of  defeat.  Brave  souls  that  have  looked  pain 
in  the  face  at  its  naked  worst,  and  through 
physical  horror  have  pierced  to  the  deathless 
glory  of  sacrifice,  are  not  likely  to  shrink  from 
the  physical  element  of  the  Passion  with  that 
fatal  fastidiousness  of  taste  which  looks  like 
refinement  but  is  in  reality  a  lack  of  the  highest 
spiritual  breeding.  It  is  the  languid  amateurs  of 
religion,  whose  shallow  sentiment  covers  an  im- 
penetrable hardness  of  heart,  that  refuse  to 
consider  even  for  one  short  half-hour  the  details 
of  an  agony  which  their  Lord  endured  for  a 
whole  long  day.  We  need  the  courage  to  hold 
up  to  men  once  more  the  Cross  in  all  its  naked- 
ness and  let  it  speak  with  its  own  inherent  elo- 
quence. We  need  not  fear  to  repel  them.  Their 
deepest  instinct  demands  the  Cross,  and  demands 
it  not  least  urgently  when  they  call  it  by  another 
name.  We  are  still  too  much  under  the  tyranny 
of  theological  terms.  Men  may  set  aside  our 
interpretation  of  the  Atonement  as  parsons'  talk  ; 
but  they  know  with  the  unshakable  knowledge 
of  the.  heart  that  the  finest,  most  sacred  thing 
in  life  is  the  self-sacrifice  of  good  men  and  women 

in 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

for  pure  love's  sake,  and  that  all  such  self-sacri- 
fice somehow  runs  back  into  the  great,  mysterious 
Cross   of  Calvary.     Such   a   presentation   of  the 
Cross   does   not   imply   a   morbid   preoccupation 
with  the  physical  details  of  the  Passion;  it  is 
consonant  with  no  less  a  reserve  than  that  of 
the   Gospel   narrative,   but   it   does   demand   an 
equal  explicitness  and  candour.     There  is  a  way 
of  preaching  the  Passion  which  appeals  only  to 
the  weak  and  neurotic  ;    but  when  rightly  em- 
phasised,  the  physical  sufferings  of  Christ  may 
become  so  many  windows  into  the  mystery  of 
pain,  the  meaning  of  redemption.     We  have  so 
largely  identified  the  Cross  with  certain  devotions 
and  services  attended  chiefly  by  elderly  ladies, 
that  we  have  forgotten  that  it  is  food  for  the 
strong  ;   that  while  it  is  the  refuge  of  the  penitent 
and  the  hope  of  sinners,  its  challenge  is  to  the 
brave.     Men    who    have    fought    for    something 
dearer  than  life  and  have  suffered  in  an  unselfish 
cause  are  quick  to  discern  that  challenge.     They 
know  without  being  told  that  to  stand  by  the 
Cross  and  look  on  is  the  final  condemnation ;  that 
he  who  has  really  seen  the  Cross  is  pledged  to 
act,   to   suffer,   to  be   ready   to  go   through  the 
world  poor,  unpopular,  misunderstood,  suspected, 
despised. 

We  need  not,  therefore,  be  too  greatly  sur- 
prised to  learn  that  "The  Imitation  of  Christ " 
was  by^  far  the  most,  popular  book  with  our 
fighting   men,   that   some   have   been   known   to 

112 


The  Highway  of  the  Gross 

apply  for  Church  membership  after  reading  it, 
and  that  copies  have  gone  the  round  of  whole 
companies,  being  passed  from  man  to  man  till 
they  fell  to  pieces.  For  while  the  book  is  vulner- 
able to  criticism  as  an  imitation  of  Christ,  and 
obviously  presupposes  a  monastic  temper  and 
outlook,  it  stands  unrivalled  as  a  piece  of  evan- 
gelical wisdom-literature,  abounding  in  sayings 
as  pregnant  and  penetrative  as  any  found  in 
the  Book  of  Proverbs.  Moreover,  it  exalts  the 
Highway  of  the  Cross  as  the  way  for  strong  men 
willing  to  take  big  risks.  It  calls  upon  the  brave 
and  true  to  share  the  Cross  of  Jesus.  The  arm- 
chair critic  may  object  that  its  call  is  limited  to 
the  sphere  of  what  used  to  be  called  personal 
sanctification  ;  but  the  man  who  has  looked 
death  in  the  face  has  learnt  the  simple  truism 
that  wherever  religion  ends,  it  must  begin  at 
home.  Jim  Bludso,  the  drunkard  and  wife- 
beater,  who  lost  his  life  in  saving  a  train,  is  a 
fact ;  and  one  need  not  quarrel  with  the  poet's 
comment  that  "  God  ain't  going  to  be  too  hard 
on  a  man  that  died  for  men/'  But  the  average 
sensible  soldier  knows  that  dying  for  men  is  not 
a  habit  with  drunkards  and  wife-beaters.  He 
has  learnt  in  a  grim  school  that  "  doing  one's 
bit  "  amid  shot  and  shell  is,  after  all,  merely  a 
curious,  crazy  new  patch  on  an  old  garment  if 
it  is  not  backed  up  and  corroborated  by  the 
daily  witness  of  a  clean,  kindly,  upright  life.  And 
when  he  reads  in  "  The  Imitation  of  Christ"  that 
i  113 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

it  takes  the  death  of  Christ,  and  a  man's  daily 
dying  with  Christ,  to  redeem  his  ordinary  stay- 
at-home  life,  he  knows  it  is  true.     Nor  is  this 
merely  a  mood  of  the  trenches.     Men  to  whom 
a  new  vision  and  a  new  aim  have  come  through 
their  experience  at  the  Front  dread  going  back 
and  working  out  their  salvation  by  the  side  of 
kinsfolk,  wives,  and  comrades  who  cannot  even 
understand  such  ideals  and  aims.     These  men — 
and  they  are  many — feel  the  power  of  the  Cross. 
They  have  no  theory  of  the  Atonement,  but  they 
know   that   the   things   they   are   determined  to 
be    loyal    to — honour,    purity,    gentleness,    un- 
selfishness— are  the  things  for  which  Christ  died, 
and  that  they  would  never*  have  sought  these 
things    if   they    had    not    been    so    unspeakably 
precious  to   Him.     Between  such  men  and  the 
Crucified    there    is    a    deep,    inarticulate    under- 
standing which  years  of  theological  insight  cannot 
produce.     Hymns  about  "the  cleansing  Blood' ' 
puzzle  or  repel  them,  or  else  they  slide  past  their 
ears  as  pretty  tunes ;  sermons  on  the  Atonement 
bore  them,  for  they  seem  irrelevant  to  the  real 
issue.    Yet  they  know  that  in  this  sign  they  shall 
conquer,  and  when,  as  in  Thomas  a  Kempis  or 
in    Brother  Lawrence,  they  catch  the  authentic 
note  of  those  who  are  experts  in  the  experimental 
science  of  the  Cross,  they  pierce  through  the  veil 
of  mediaeval  phraseology,  which  the  "  advanced  " 
theologian  often  finds  an  insurmountable  barrier, 
with  the  swift  insight  of  spiritual  affinity. 

114 


The  Highway  of  the  Gross 


II 

But  while  the  men  who  have  thus  grasped  the 
Cross  in  one  experimental  aspect  have  little  taste 
or  aptitude  for  theology,  it  does  not  follow,  of 
course,  that  the  Church  can  dispense  with  an 
objective  doctrine  of  the  Cross.  It  is  by  such 
a  doctrine  that  the  fire  of  sacrifice  has  been  kept 
burning  in  the  temple  of  humanity  ;  and  while 
history  has  proved  how  disastrous  it  is  to  preach 
theology  to  men  who  are  temperamentally  unable 
to  appreciate  theological  arguments  but  who 
are  intensely  interested  in  religion,  it  has  also 
proved  that  whenever  the  pulpit  has  disparaged 
objective  doctrine  in  the  interests  of  subjective 
intuition,  religion  itself  has  decayed.  Yet  it 
remains  true  that  whatever  be  the  importance 
of  doctrine,  the  preacher,  as  distinct  from  the 
theologian,  must  approach  it  not  technically  but 
experimentally.  He  must  lead  his  hearers  into 
a  deeper  thought  of  the  Cross  as  a  truth  by  pre- 
senting it  first  of  all  as  a  way  and  a  life. 

Nor  must  it  be  left  to  the  pulpit  to  exalt  the 
Cross.  The  whole  of  public  worship  should  be 
the  sacr amentum  of  the  soldiers  of  the  Cross. 
That'  it  is  anything  like  that,  few  would  care  to 
maintain.  The  average  Church  of  England  service 
offers  a  beautiful  but  antiquated  liturgy  not 
understanded  of  the  common  people,  and  breathing 
a  subdued,   restrained   atmosphere  which,   how- 

^5 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

ever  great  its  charm,  has  little  in  common  with 
the  intense  devotion,  the  passionate  resolve,  the 
unreserved  determination  to  risk  and  dare,  to 
endure  and  sacrifice,  which  well  up  from  hearts 
newly  opened  to  the  love  of  God.  Nor  does 
the  average  Nonconformist  service,  with  its 
stereotyped  complement  of  hymns,  many  of  which 
have  little  relation  to  the  religious  experience 
of  to-day,  and  its  prayers,  which  offer  no  oppor- 
tunity for  personal  and  corporate  response,  leave 
much  room  for  those  acts  of  dedication  and  fealty, 
and  for  that  solemn  self-identification  with  God's 
will  which  are  the  natural  movement  of  souls  that 
have  seen  Jesus.  It  must,  of  course,  be  borne 
in  mind  that  no  service  which  is  really  a  service 
of  common  prayer  can  express  that  movement 
exclusively.  It  must  provide  equally  for  the 
slower  pulse,  the  more  tentative  approach  of 
those  who  have  not  so  learnt  Christ.  More- 
over, liturgical  reform  is  at  all  times  a  difficult 
and  complicated  matter,  and  must,  to  a  large 
extent,  be  left  to  the  expert  who  at  the  same 
time  knows  the  psychology  of  the  Christian 
soul  from  the  inside.  But  it  cannot  be  too 
strongly  emphasised  that  any  form  or  type  of 
worship  which  does  not  give  expression  to  the 
aspirations  and  loyalties  of  those  to  whom  there 
has  come  a  new  vision  of  purpose  is  gravely  at 
fault.  To  be  convinced  that  this  is  so,  and  to  be 
so  deeply  convinced  of  it  that  it  becomes  a  trouble 
and  a  burden,  is  the  first  step  towards  true  reform. 

h6 


The  Highway  of  the  Gross 

And  if  our  worship  is  to  reflect  these  aspira- 
tions and  loyalties,  the  life  of  the  Church  must 
recover  the  same  note.  That  our  Church  life 
bears  the  image  and  superscription  of  the  Cross, 
even  its  stoutest  defenders  would  hardly  be  bold 
enough  to  assert.  As  far  as  the  broad,  shallow, 
untroubled  stream  of  conventional  Churchman- 
ship  is  concerned,  the  Cross  still  waits,  and  before 
we  can  take  it  up  there  is  much  we  must  lay 
down.  "  Thou  hast  yet  much  to  part  with  " — 
here  lies  the  secret  of  our  failure. 

There  is  our  ecclesiastical  past  to  be  sur- 
rendered— not  to  be  forgotten,  indeed,  but  to  be 
taken  from  our  own  vainglorious  hands  and 
placed  in  the  hands  of  our  Lord.  Dead  theories, 
dead  traditions,  dead  methods,  how  we  hug 
them  to  our  bosom,  sacrificing  His  sore  travail 
for  souls  to  our  obstinate  and  self-willed  adher- 
ence to  the  old  rather  than  the  true  !  Nor  are 
we  necessarily  a  step  nearer  the  truth  when  we 
exchange  new  methods  for  old.  We  still  often 
speak  of  the  need  for  a  new  theology  or  new 
institutions,  as  if  it  were  a  matter  of  discarding 
old  shoes  for  new.  There  is  no  salvation  in 
such  a  shallow  or  light-hearted  procedure.  What 
is  fundamentally  in  question  is  not  a  new  the- 
ology or  new  methods — that  is  why  so  many  of 
the  books  on  religious  reconstruction  seem  in- 
adequate to  the  situation  in  exact  proportion 
as  they  are  "  up'  to  date  " — but  a  new  soul, 
the  kind  of  soul  that  can  address  itself  to  the 

117 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

task  of  theological  and  practical  reconstruction 
with  spiritual  effect.  Reconstruction  is  not  the 
Church's  first  task.  To  surrender  the  past,  to 
be  willing  to  begin  again,  to  accept  whatever 
comes  with  the  seal  of  God's  will  upon  it,  be 
it  startlingly  new  or  disconcertingly  old,  to  care 
very  little  about  popular  catchwords  but  every- 
thing about  obeying  the  great  Captain's  orders 
— that  is  the  Church's  first  business  in  this  dim- 
cult  and  exacting  day.  It  is  a  task  that  gives 
no  scope  for  spectacular  heroism.  There  is  nothing 
to  show  at  the  end,  except  an  emptied  and  docile 
mind,  ready  to  follow  wherever  Christ  leads. 

And  with  our  past  there  must  go — and  go 
for  ever — a  whole  host  of  cherished  conceptions 
and  ideals  which  have  passed  too  long  as  Christian. 
The  Church's  conception  of  sin,  for  instance,  is 
still  more  conventional  than  evangelical.  We 
still  label  certain  gross  transgressions,  especially 
those  we  are  pleased  to  call  national  sins,  as 
sins  par  excellence,  forgetting  that  if  the  Gospel 
is  true,  the  gross  sinner  often  retains  the  capacity 
of  recognising  the  pure  and  holy  Redeemer  when 
he  sees  Him,  where  smug,  complacent  Pharisaism 
can  look  Incarnate  Goodness  in  the  face  and 
exclaim,  "  He  hath  a  devil !  "  But  if  that  is  so, 
what  becomes  of  our  conventional  valuation, 
what  of  our  persistent  belauding  of  the  merely 
respectable,  the  morally  mediocre,  the  negatively 
good  ?  The  truth  is  we  have  never  yet  had  the 
courage  to  stand  for  "  the  blazing  scandal  and 

118 


The  Highway  of  the  Cross 

indiscretion  "  of  Christ's  estimate  of  sin,  but  in 
face  of  it  have  persistently  cherished  the  me- 
chanical and  sterile  ideal  of  a  goodness  which  is 
three-fourths  propriety.  And  this  is  only  one 
of  many  conceptions  and  ideals  current  in  the 
Church  which,  while  claiming  Christ's  sanction, 
constitute  a  fundamental,  though  often  uncon- 
scious, disloyalty  to  Him.  Everything  that  puts 
respectability  before  love,  everything  that  esteems 
success  above  faithfulness,  everything  that  hinders 
the  Church  from  becoming  a  refuge  for  the  world's 
outcasts  and  a  terror  to  the  world's  idols — every 
such  thought  or  practice,  however  alluring  and 
highly  reputed,  must  go  if  the  Church  is  to 
authenticate  herself  to  those  who  have  genuine 
insight  into  the  genius  of  Christianity. 

But  to  surrender  these  things  means  to  take 
up  the  Cross.  The  Church  that  stands  for  some- 
thing other  than  the  vaguely  religious  ideals 
which  appeal  to  the  majority  of  well-meaning 
people  who  have  not  yet  come  within  sight  of 
Calvary  will  find  herself  driven  into  the  wilder- 
ness for  a  season.  True,  the  earnest,  simple, 
brave-hearted  souls  to  whom  a  world-crisis  has 
brought  a  new  experience,  inarticulate  yet  pro- 
foundly real,  will  rally  to  her  standard.  But  it 
will  take  years  before  she  will  understand  how 
to  guide  and  utilise  these  new  disciples  who  lack 
the  most  elementary  prolegomena  of  Church- 
manship,  to  whom  Scriptural,  let  alone  theological, 
language  is  an  unfamiliar  tongue,  who  cannot  see 

119 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

the  reasonableness  of  things  which  are  axiomatic 
to  those  nurtured  in  the  Church,  and  who  take 
notjthe  slightest  interest  in  questions  that  are 
of  grave  concern  to  Church  folk.  It  will  mean 
misunderstanding,  friction,  disappointments,  and 
set-backs.  The  Church  will  be  tempted  again 
and  again  to  pander  to  her  new  constituency  as 
she  pandered  to  her  old  one  ;  but  if  she  wishes 
to  persevere  in  the  Royal  Highway  of  the  Cross, 
she  must  follow  where  it  leads,  even  though  from 
that  time  many  of  her  disciples  go  back  and 
walk  no  more  with  her. 

In  reading  books  dealing  with  the  Church's 
past  failure  and  outlining  a  programme  for  the 
future,  one  sometimes  wonders  if  their  authors 
are  aware  of  the  existence  of  the  Cross  as  the 
central  fact  of  the  spiritual  universe.  They 
rightly  take  the  Church  to  task  for  her  tradition- 
alism, her  deference  to  wealth  and  social  position, 
her  conventionality  and  tameness  ;  in  short,  for 
her  lack  of  real  Christianity.  They  then  proceed 
to  define  a  Christian  Church  as  one  that  has 
democratic  sympathies,  does  self-denying  social 
service,  makes  for  helpfulness  and  comradeship, 
gives  a  reasonable  answer  to  men's  doubts,  makes 
religion  attractive  to  the  average  good  fellow 
who  wants  to  "do  his  bit/'  and  affords  him  the 
moral  support  and  social  fellowship  which  he 
needs  to  help  him  to  "  keep  straight. "  Such  a 
Church,  they  not  unreasonably  assert,  would 
never   need   to   complain   of   empty   pews   or   a 

1 20 


The  Highway  of  the  Qross 

decline  in  membership.  And  this  ideal  would 
be  entirely  commendable — if  Jesus  had  not  died 
upon  the  Cross,  and  if  the  Church  of  the  New 
Testament  had  not  been  a  Church  of  men  who 
had  been  redeemed  and  made  one  by  an  experience 
which  can  only  be  explained  in  terms  of  the  Cross. 
As  we  read  the  Gospel  story  of  the  passion  and 
death  of  Jesus,  so  terrible  in  its  restrained  sim- 
plicity, so  compelling  in  its  unexpressed  appeal, 
the  ideal  of  a  Church  based  upon  the  conception 
of  Christ  as  merely  "  the  Lord  of  all  good  life  " 
and  designed  to  appeal  to  the  average  good  fellow 
looks  pitifully  small  and  cheap. 


Ill 

If  Christianity  is  indeed  a  universal  religion 
— and  only  a  world-religion  can  meet  the  need 
of  any  nation  or  class — it  must  be  of  wider  im- 
port than  is  indicated  by  the  idiosyncrasies  of 
the  average  man,  be  he  Englishman  or  Hindu. 
We  are  anxious  to  remove  from  Christianity 
every  element  that  antagonises  that  average 
man,  and  we  imagine  that  in  doing  so  we  are 
getting  rid  of  narrowing  dogmas  and  obscuring 
accretions.  But  what  if  these  things,  so  far 
from  being  man-made  limitations  of  Christianity, 
are  the  very  marks  of  its  universality  ?  What 
if  the  objections  of  the  average  man,  instead  of 
being   the   righteous  rebellion   of  the   free   soul, 

121 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

are  the  blind  protestations  of  the  limited,  the 
insular  soul  ?  It  is  because  Christianity  em- 
braces the  whole  world  in  its  sweep,  because  it 
includes  in  perfect  proportion  every  valid  spiritual 
ideal  and  aspiration,  that  it  repels  as  well  as 
attracts  the  natural  man,  and  repels  that  it  may 
the  more  potently  attract.  It  was  not  its  narrow- 
ness that  made  it  a  stumbling-block  to  the  Jews 
and  foolishness  to  the  Greeks.  It  irritated  both 
because  it  attempted  to  lead  both  into  a  wider 
world,  opening  the  eye  of  the  Hebrew  to  the 
glory  of  suffering,  and  initiating  the  Greek  into 
a  deeper  knowledge  than  that  of  the  intellect 
merely.  It  offended  men,  and  offends  men  to- 
day, as  perfect  symmetry  offends  the  eye  that 
is  used  to  one-sidedness  and  disproportion.  It 
is  precisely  its  full-orbed  perfection  that  makes 
it,  wherever  faithfully  preached,  something  of 
a  stinging  provocation  alike  to  the  honest  good 
fellow  in  England,  who  suspects  it  of  being  other- 
worldly, and  to  the  ascetic  Hindu,  who  regards 
it  as  decidedly  worldly.  Shall  we  really  seek 
to  escape  this  difficulty  by  preaching  a  jolly, 
common-sense  version  of  Christianity  to  the  British 
working-man,  and  an  esoteric,  etherealised  version 
to  the  religious  Hindu  ?  No  sane  person  would 
consider  such  an  expedient  with  any  seriousness. 
There  must  be,  soi  course,  many  different  avenues 
of  approach  to  Christianity,  and  the  wise  teacher 
will  not  dream  of  trying  to  force  the  Eastern 
mind  to  enter  the  Temple  by  the  same  gate  as 

122 


The  Highway  of  the  Cross 

the  Western.  Yet  he  will  never  allow  himself 
to  forget  that  the  object  of  Christianity  is  to 
make  East  and  West  one  by  initiating  both 
into  a  new  type  of  life  in  which  their  differences 
are  not  fostered,  but  transcended,  and  their 
one-sidednesses  corrected,  as  only  life  can  tran- 
scend and  correct  the  limitations  of  race  and 
temperament.  To  enter  into  this  new  life,  how- 
ever many  be  its  gates,  cannot  be  easy  either 
for  the  East  or  for  the  West ;  and  as  long  as  we 
conceive  it  our  mission  to  offer  to  each  only 
those  elements  in  Christianity  which  correspond 
to  its  idiosyncrasies,  so  long  will  the  coming  of 
that  creative,  unifying  life  be  delayed. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  the  old  word  concerning 
the  blessedness  of  them  that  are  not  offended  in 
Jesus  finds  its  relevancy.  There  is  something 
in  Jesus — something  in  His  way  of  looking  at 
things,  and  His  way  of  appraising  things — that 
shocks  the  judgment  of  the  natural  man,  limited 
as  it  is  by  racial  and  temperamental  preposses- 
sions. Whether  we  be  cast  in  a  Hebraic  or  in  a 
pagan  mould,  whether  our  affinities  are  with 
the  meditative  East  or  with  the  pragmatic  West, 
we  cannot  look  at  Jesus  with  unveiled  eyes  with- 
out being  conscious  of  that  collision  which  the 
Gospels  call  "  offence."  It  is  not  doubt,  though 
it  may  be  described  as  the  ethical  and  spiritual 
correlative  of  doubt.  It  is  to  faith  what  paradox 
is  to  reason.  It  stands  at  the  cross-roads  from 
where  the  shining  path  of  faith  and  the  dark 

123 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

trail  of  despair  branch  off  to  their  respective 
ends.  The  pilgrim  may  evade  it  ;  and  the 
result  of  such  evasion  is  writ  large  in  the  utter 
impotence  of  all  versions  of  Christianity  from 
which  the  element  of  offence  has  been  excised. 
The  reason  why  the  religious  liberalism  which 
distilled  an  undogmatic  Christianity  from  the 
New  Testament  was  powerless  to  produce  any- 
thing more  important  than  a  small  circle  of 
mildly  thoughtful  apostles  of  sweetness  and 
light  is  that  Christian  personality  can  only  be 
created  by  man's  contact  with  those  stern  collisions 
of  the  Gospel  which  challenge  our  obtuseness 
and  make  us  aware  of  the  tremendousness  of 
our  salvation.  While  a  liberal  interpretation  of 
the  Christian  facts  doubtless  makes  it  more 
easy  for  a  man  to  accept  Christianity,  it  makes 
it  far  more  difficult  for  him  to  retain  it  amid  the 
grim  problems  which  life  sets  to  a  facile  and 
gently  reasonable  faith.  Nowhere  does  Ibsen's 
"  Easy  to  lift,  difficult  to  carry "  find  such 
poignant  application. 

And  the  offence  of  Christianity  centres  in 
the  Cross.  To  preach  that  Cross,  not  merely 
as  a  model  of  selfless  love  and  sacrifice  which 
we  can  follow,  though  at  a  distance,  but  as  a 
great,  unique,  objective  fact,  a  settled  axiom 
of  the  spiritual  world  which  must  re-make  us 
before  we  can  speak  of  "  recapitulating "  it,  is 
to  preach  the  great  "  offence/'  To  lift  up  the 
Cross  once  more  as  the  supreme  revelation  of 

124 


The  Highway  of  the  Gross 

sin,  of  righteousness,  and  of  judgment ;  as  the 
redeeming  Act  of  God  giving  Himself  in  love 
that  risks  all ;  as  the  power  that  has  broken 
down  and  is  breaking  down  all  barriers  of  race, 
class  and  sex,  that  has  destroyed  and  is  destroy- 
ing the  present  world-order,  is  to  confront  men 
with  something  that  cuts  deep  into  their  most 
cherished  interests  and  aims.  The  man  who 
sets  out  to  tread  the  way  of  the  Cross  honestly 
but  not  knowing  whither  he  goes,  and  who  does 
not  sooner  or  later  come  face  to  face  with  the 
offence — that  great  challenging  element  in  the 
Cross  which  makes  demands  flesh  and  blood 
cannot  entertain  with  equanimity — will  not  re- 
main on  that  road  very  long.  He  will  trail  off 
down  some  flowery  by-path,  and  in  the  end 
will  have  nothing  left  of  his  initial  aspiration 
except,  perchance,  a  faded,  sentimental  piety 
that  likes  to  have  a  nicely-carved  cross  on  its 
pvie-dieu.  Some  day  the  pilgrim  of  the  Cross 
must  be  brought  to  the  point  where  he  really 
sees  that  to  which  his  generous  ignorance  has 
committed  him.  It  rests  with  the  Church  to  see 
to  it  that  he  does  not  miss  that  crucial  bend  of 
the  road  ;  that  the  flowers  of  pulpit  rhetoric, 
popular  religious  poetry,  and  facile  sentiment 
do  not  hide  the  true  Cross  from  him.  It  is 
because  she  has  done  so  little  to  make  men  truly 
and  wholly  Christian  and  so  much  to  keep  them 
Church  members  that  her  message  lacks  power, 
and  her  life  fails  to  convince. 

12$ 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  CROSS  AND  THE  ALTAR 

In  the  middle  of  St.  Paul's 'great  polemic  against 
the  Judaisers,  when  the  Apostle  seems  to  have 
disappeared  behind  the  controversialist,  we  come 
upon  the  classic  outburst,  "  God  forbid  that  I 
should  glory,  save  in  the  Cross  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  by  whom  the  world  is  crucified  unto  me, 
and  I  unto  the  world/'  The  words  are  used 
with  a  polemic  intention,  yet  such  is  their  in- 
herent magic,  their  indissoluble  connection  with 
a  larger  context,  that  the  argumentative  leader 
and  his  irritating  opponents  disappear.  We  are 
out  on  the  deeps  of  God.  The  ephemeral  has 
receded,  and  we  are  left  face  to  face  with  the 
tremendous  fact  that  for  Paul  the  whilom  Pharisee, 
who  had  never  seen  Jesus  in  the  flesh,  there 
was  but  one  thing  wherein  to  glory — His  Cross  ; 
and  that  this  glorying  of  his  set  the  world  on 
fire  from  end  to  end.  Church  history  makes 
melancholy  reading,  but  the  true  life  of  the 
Church  is  no  more  contained  in  the  events  of 
Church  history  than  the  true  life  of  England  can 
be  gathered  from  the  newspapers.  It  is  found 
in  the  great  succession  of  men  and  women  of 
all   races,   types    of   culture    and    training    who, 

136 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

glorying  in  the  same  Cross,  have  been  living 
witnesses  to  its  grace  and  power.  It  is  for  want 
of  a  Church  glorying  in  the  Cross  that  our  preach- 
ing of  it  is  feeble  and  unattractive.  We  apologise 
for  it,  we  explain  it  very  carefully,  we  seek  to 
formulate  a  sane  theology  of  it,  and  to  interpret 
it  in  consonance  with  present-day  feeling.  But 
we  cannot  as  a  Church  be  said  to  glory  in  it ; 
if  we  glory  at  all,  it  is  in  our  courage  to  preach 
it  in  these  difficult  days.  And  as  we  contrast 
St.  Paul's  exultant  joy  in  the  Cross  with  our 
demure  acceptance  of  it,  and  once  more  look 
into  the  meaning  of  the  apostle's  exclamation 
and  into  the  experience  which  lies  behind  it, 
we  may  discover  how  to  preach  the  Cross,  as 
well  as  the  reason  why  we  fail  to  glory  in  it. 


It  was  not  in  his  own  cross  that  St.  Paul  gloried. 
We  can  understand  him  better  when  he  speaks 
of  glorying  in  tribulation,  but  the  thought  of 
exultation  in  a  cross  not  our  own  is  becoming 
increasingly  foreign  to  us.  In  glorying  in 
the  Cross  of  Jesus  Christ,  the  great  Apostle 
exulted,  not  primarily  in  the  Cross  as  a  s3-mbol 
of  service,  but  in  the  Cross  that  creates  penitence 
by  revealing  man's  sin  as  seen  in  the  light  of 
a  Love  so  great  that  humiliatioja  is  sweetened 
with  gratitude  and  self-contempt  glorified  with 
adoring  wonder,  as  we  gaze  into  its  depth.     It 

137 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

is  impossible  to  over-emphasise  the  importance 
of  service,  but  it  is  quite  easy  to  lay  a  false  em- 
phasis upon  it.  Much  of  our  present-day  teach- 
ing is  almost  hysterical  in  its  exaggerated  stress 
upon  the  need  for  utilising  the  passion  for  service, 
and  in  its  reiterated  warnings  against  repelling 
men  by  calling  them  to  repentance.  In  support 
of  such  a  view,  the  story  of  Christ's  call  to  His 
first  disciples  is  twisted  out  of  its  elucidating 
context.  We  are  told  that  Jesus,  in  calling  the 
Galilean  fishermen  from  their  nets,  summoned 
them  to  a  stirring  enterprise,  a  glorious  adven- 
ture, making  no  conditions  except  willingness 
to  serve,  imposing  no  test  save  that  of  loyalty. 
But  the  facts  will  not  bear  construing  in  the  light 
of  this  modern  convention.  Behind  them  lies  the 
ministry  of  John  the  Baptist — a  ministry  which 
Jesus  acknowledged,  making  its  message  of  re- 
pentance the  text  of  His  early  preaching.  The 
disciples  were  familiar  with  the  concept  of  re- 
pentance and  penitence  ;  what  they  needed  was 
to  be  emancipated  from  it,  that  they  might  return 
to  it  later  and  invest  it  with  the  new  content 
created  by  their  experience  of  Christ.  To  argue 
as  if  they  were  twentieth-century  Englishmen, 
as  is  so  often  done  in  the  interests  of  a  vicious 
apologetic,  is  surely  to  juggle  with  an  historical 
situation. 

We  are  to-olay  in  the  trough  of  a  reaction 
against  a  theology — ostensibly  Protestant,  but 
essentially  a  Roman  legacy — which  hypostatises 

128 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

sin  as  if  it  were  a  tangible  substance  that  can 
be  viewed  apart  from  its  concrete  manifestations, 
and  judged  apart  from  the  circumstances  under 
which  it  is  committed  and  from  the  person  who 
commits  it.  This  type  of  theology  has  always 
tended  to  foster  a  negative  attitude,  making 
not  positive  goodness  but  mere  sinlessness  the 
Christian's  goal,  and  defining  sin  as  what  Dora 
Green  well  calls  "  the  violation  of  a  sort  of  divinely 
constituted  etiquette/ '  The  inevitable  conse- 
quence of  such  a  conception  is  to  use  the  term 
"repentance"  with  a  technical  connotation,  in- 
telligible to  minds  trained  in  theological  distinc- 
tions and  ecclesiastical  subtleties,  but  quite 
remote  from  the  thought  and  feeling  of  the  average 
layman,  and  corresponding  to  nothing  in  his 
religious  experience.  It  is  out  of  the  reaction 
against  a  presentation  of  the  Gospel  which  re- 
duced both  sin  and  repentance  to  theological 
abstractions  that  the  present-day  cult  of  adven- 
ture and  service  takes  its  rise.  But  while  it  is 
obviously  true  that  every  generous  instinct  of 
the  human  heart  protests  against  a  religion  which 
is  little  more  than  a  fire-escape,  no  useful  end 
is  served  when  responsible  teachers  and  leaders 
speak  as  if  it  was  a  case  of  having  to  choose 
between  a  caricature  of  Christianity  and  a  pre- 
sentation of  it  which  puts  service  before  penitence, 
and  accepts  a  vague  allegiance  to  Christ  as  a 
substitute  for  complete  discipleship.  We  are 
involved  in  no  such  dilemma.  Whatever  a  by- 
J  129 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

gone  theology  has  made  of  sin  and  repentance, 
we    know    them    to    be    profound    realities,    and 
therefore  capable  of  being  presented  convincingly 
to  men  of  good  will  in  every  age.      A  passion 
for  service  is  to   be  welcomed  as  of   the  most 
hopeful  augury ;  but  it  is  destined  to  barrenness, 
unless  it  be  used  as  a  stepping-stone  to  a  genuine 
realisation  of  sin  and  a  lifelong  repentance.     This 
is    only    what    our    experience    of   everyday   life 
indicates.     We  would  think  very  little  of  a  man 
whose  first   thought,   after  having   wronged  the 
soul  of  the  woman  whose  honour  is  in  his  keeping, 
is  to  redouble  his  external  attentions  and  expend 
more  money  upon  presents.     What  we  instinc- 
tively demand  from  such  a  one  is,  first  of  all,  a 
sense  of  shame  and  guilt  so  deep  that  he  hesitates 
to  approach  his  victim,   feeling  his  very  touch 
would  be  an  added  insult.     If  we  did  approve 
of  the  external  service,  it  would  be  in  the  case 
of  coarse-grained  natures,  in  whom  it  is  the  out- 
ward sign  of  a  growing  inward  penitence.     Why 
should    we    leave    our   healthy    instincts    behind 
us   when   we    approach    the   deepest    aspects   of 
life  ?     Why   should   we,    misled   by    an   entirely 
natural    desire    to    make    religion    attractive    to 
men,  act  as  if  to  conceive  of  it  as  "  doing  one's 
bit,"  and  to  regard  worship,  adoration,  confession 
and  penitence  as  so  much  "  trimming  "  were  not 
merely   understandable,  but   a   positive  advance 
upon  what  we  are  pleased  to  call  a  superseded 
type  of  religion  ?     If  the  ancient  Greeks  recog- 

130 


The  Cross  and  the  Altar 

nised  that  life  needed  to  be  purged  by  pity  and 
terror,  can  we  do  less  ?  And  in  seeking  to  regain 
a  true  conception  of  repentance,  we  shall  secure 
that  pity  and  terror,  instead  of  being  instruments 
of  world-weariness  and  despair,  as  they  were 
in  the  ancient  world,  shall  be  the  instruments 
of  life  abounding  and  full  of  joy. 

Is  it  really  true  that  the  Christian  mind,  in 
insisting  upon  repentance  as  the  foundation  of 
all  genuine  religion,  has  smitten  the  life  of  past 
ages  with  gloom  and  morbidness  ?  One  would 
almost  think  so,  to  judge  from  the  utterances 
of  certain  teachers  and  preachers,  who  seem  to 
view  Christian  teaching  exclusively  through  the 
somewhat  unreliable  medium  of  the  man  at  the 
front.  One  freely  admits  that  it  is  high  time 
that  we  saw  ourselves  "  as  Tommy  sees  us  "  ;  but 
the  salutary  force  of  such  a  view  is  not  increased 
in  the  very  least  by  imagining  that  we  are  gazing 
at  an  entirely  faithful  likeness.  That  "  Tommy  " 
sees  us  as  he  does — as  a  doleful  company  of  prigs 
and  weaklings,  wasting  our  time  in  repenting 
of  imaginary  sins  and  in  performing  useless 
ceremonies,  and  too  much  concerned  about  the 
things  we  ought  not  to  do  to  have  any  time 
left  for  doing  anything  that  is  positively  good 
— is  largely  our  own  fault,  but  by  no  means 
entirely  so.  To  imply  that  "  Tommy  "  enjoys 
a  clarity  of  vision  and  correctness  of  judgment 
denied  to  most  mortals,  and  claimed  least  of  all 
by  those  who  know  the  object  of  his  criticism 

131 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

from  the  inside,  is  one  of  those  aberrations  of 
enthusiasm  which  will  cost  us  dear  if  allowed 
to  persist  unchecked.  "  Tommy's  "  view,  how- 
ever deeply  to  be  pondered,  is  not  the  light  that 
can  guide  us  through  the  maze  of  failure  and 
perplexity ;  and  to  reject  the  old  theological 
definitions  of  sin,  repentance,  holiness,  and  wor- 
ship merely  to  substitute  for  them  the  crude  and 
often  distorted  conceptions  of  "  the  man  in  the 
street  "  would  be  a  ludicrous  proceeding,  were 
it  not  profoundly  pathetic. 

Unless  we  recover  the  note  of  repentance 
and  penitence,  our  religion  will  become  but 
another  form  of  moral  sentiment  and  social 
service,  and  thus  cease  to  be  a  religion — a  force 
that  creates  moral  sentiment  and  inspires  social 
service.  And  we  can  only  recover  it  by  re- 
discovering the  Cross  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 
It  is  a  positive  message  that  is  in  question,  not 
a  barren  protest.  To  inform  a  man  who  is 
attracted  to  Christianity  by  his  desire  to  serve 
that  he  will  not  be  allowed  to  serve  until  he  has 
somehow  attained  to  a  sufficient  realisation  of 
his  unworthiness  and  to  an  adequate  feeling  of 
penitence  is  to  repel  him  without  bringing  him 
one  iota  nearer  to  reality.  But  as  we  confront 
such  a  one  with  the  Cross,  showing  its  bearing, 
not  upon  the  vague,  theoretical  quantity  called 
sin,  but  upon  the  meanness  of  our  best  service, 
the  littleness  and  shoddiness  of  our  highest 
motives    and    intentions,    the    poorness    of    our 

l32 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

most  energetic  efforts,  the  feeble,  anaemic  hue 
of  our  virtues,  and  the  pitiful  folly  of  our  faults 
and  defections,  shame  and  aspiration  will  be 
born  in  the  heart  that  is  willing  to  face  so  searching 
a  revelation.  A  profounder  recognition  of  inbred 
sin  and  a  more  subduing  sense  of  wonder  and 
adoring  love  may  come  later — how  far  a  man 
will  pierce  into  the  depths  of  the  spirit  depends 
largely  upon  his  temperament — but  meanwhile 
there  will  be  honest  shame  and  a  dim  yet  real 
conviction  that  the  only  chance  for  such  a  poor, 
stained,  twisted  life  as  his  is  to  keep  very  close 
to  the  Crucified.  In  the  measure  in  which  a 
genuine  repentance  is  present,  penitence  will 
become  the  man's  habitual  attitude.  From  see- 
ing himself  foolish,  mean  and  warped,  he  will 
come  to  trace  within  his  soul  a  fatal  desire  to 
evade  the  claims  and  consequences  of  the  Cross. 
He  will  discover  the  radical  twist  in  his  will,  the 
lurking  antipathy  of  his  heart  to  a  goodness 
which  is  something  other  than  mere  good  nature. 
At  this  point  it  will  dawn  upon  him  that  some- 
thing more  is  needed  than  the  mere  recognition 
of  the  objective  fact  of  the  Cross;  something 
more  even  than  an  attitude  of  thankful  wonder 
and  humble  love  towards  the  Crucified.  He 
will,  in  fact,  be  prepared  to  enter  into  the  Pauline 
conception  of  being  crucified  with  Christ.  Glorying 
in  a  Cross  not  his  own,  St.  Paul  nailed  his  life 
to  it  until  he  was  dead,  not  merely  to  the  old 
world-order,  but  to  the  old  self. 

133 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

One  is  accustomed  to  hear  this  experience 
dismissed  as  a  piece  of  exaggerated  symbolism, 
a  mystical  feeling  having  no  foothold  in  reality. 
And  it  certainly  is  no  more  than  that,  so  long 
as  it  is  divorced  from  an  objective  doctrine  of 
the  Cross  and  from  the  penitence  which  it  creates. 
It  is  astonishing  how  glibly  such  sentiments  as 
"  suffering  with  Christ  on  behalf  of  men,"  "  shar- 
ing His  agony  over  nations  at  war/'  and  actually 
"  bearing  the  burden  of  a  broken,  bleeding  world 
as  He  bore  it  "  fall  from  the  lips  of  fashionable 
devotees  of  pseudo-mysticism.  That  such  senti- 
ments often  coexist  with  an  all  but  impregnable 
self^righteousness,  and  with  an  amazingly  super- 
cilious attitude  towards  poor,  benighted  people 
who  "  still  "  believe  in  the  "  official  "  doctrine 
of  the  Atonement,  is  not  to  be  wondered  at. 
Whenever  fellowship  in  Christ's  sufferings'  does 
not  begin  with  a  deep  inward  hatred  of  the  sins 
that  caused  them,  chiefly  the  sins  of  one's  own 
heart,  it  is  a  piece  of  that  unreality  and  self- 
deception  which  dog  the  religious  temperament. 


II 

For  generations  past  we  have  theologised  about 
the  Cross  to  the  point  of  losing  our  good  temper 
and  Christian  charity,  and  almost  to  the  point 
of  losing  our  own  souls,  but  we  have  been  far 
too  little  concerned  to  ask  if  we  know  what  it 
means  to  be  crucified  with  Christ.     Yet  if  the 

*34 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

testimony  of  St.  Paul  is  valid,  we  have  no  right 
to  theologise  at  all,  except  upon  the  basis  of 
the  crucified  life.  Whether  our  theology  be 
orthodox  or  heterodox  matters  very  little  ;  in 
either  case  it  is  a  sheer  impertinence,  unless  we 
bear  the  Cross  stamped  upon  the  fibre  of  our 
lives.  Like  the  Fathers  of  Nicaea,  we  must 
come  into  the  arena  of  theological  discussion 
with  the  marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus  upon  us.  Our 
theology  must  be  graven  upon  the  palms  of 
our  hands. 

But  how  are  we  to  commend  the  crucified 
life  to  a  generation  that  looks  upon  the  ascetic 
element  in  religion  as  so  much  mediaeval  lumber  ? 
What  can  demonstrate  its  power  and  glory  to 
"  the  man  in  the  street  " — or  the  man  in  the 
pew,  for  that  matter  ? 

The  task  should  not  be  so  difficult,  after  all. 
For  the  crucified  life  is  the  surrendered  life,  and 
if  we  have  learnt  anything  during  these  years 
of  stress  and  strain,  it  is  that  the  only  life  worth 
living  is  the  life  that  is  freely  given  to  a  good 
cause  ;  not  lent  with  calculating  intent,  but 
flung  down  with  the  superb  generosity  of  youth. 
Men  who  have  learnt  this  lesson  will  surely  not 
be  surprised  when  we  tell  them  that  the  only 
thing  that  really  matters  in  religion  is  whether 
our  souls,  our  wills,  our  deepest  selves  are  really 
surrendered  to  God.  Such  men  will  have  no 
difficulty  in  understanding  St.  Ignatius  Loyola's 
saying,  "  Give  me  twelve  men  wholly  surrendered 

i35 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

to  God,  and  I  will  convert  the  world  with  them/' 
Their  experience  will  supply  them  with  an 
analogy  to  the  saint's  lament  that  "  very  few 
men  understand  what  God  would  do  with  them 
if  they  would  yield  themselves  entirely  to  Him/' 
Unreserved  surrender  to  a  great  power,  a  mighty 
impulse — their  hearts  vibrate  to  that  iron  string. 
The  Christian  therefore  who  has  begun  in 
penitence  and  ended  at  the  Cross  can  to-day 
appeal  to  his  neighbours  for  whom  religion  merely 
means  "  doing  one's  bit "  with  a  confidence 
which  was  impossible  before.  "I,  too,"  he  might 
say,  "  want  to  serve.  But  then  I  want  to  be 
quite  sure  that  I  am  bringing  my  best  to  my 
service.  I  feel  I  dare  not  bring  to  it  a  soul 
choked  with  its  own  prejudices  and  predilections, 
a  will  poisoned  and  warped  by  subtle  self-seeking, 
a  spirit  obsessed  by  its  faulty  aspirations  and 
ideals — by  that  good,  in  fact,  which  is  the  enemy 
of  the  best.  I  want  to  bring  a  crucified  life — 
a  spirit  that  is  dead  to  self  and  alive  to  God — 
to  the  saving  of  society.  I  want  to  lose  my  life 
with  Christ  before  I  have  the  hardihood  to  try 
and  save  the  life  of  my  generation.  I  dare  not 
criticise  the  existing  order  of  things  so  long  as 
my  disabling  prejudices,  my  undisciplined  in- 
clinations, have  not  been  killed  at  the  root.  I 
believe  it  takes  the  best  of  us  a  lifetime  to  dis- 
tinguish between  our  convictions  and  our  pre- 
judices, and  for  myself  I  have  discovered  that 
I    cannot    distinguish    between    mine    except    as 

136 


The  Cross  and  the  Altar 

I  nail  both  to  the  Cross.  I  have  tried  to  serve 
without  the  Cross,  but  my  efforts  were  so  queerly 
out  of  keeping  with  the  rest  of  my  life ;  and 
this  led  to  the  discovery  that  one  cannot  use 
one's  will  day  after  day  in  the  service  of  one's 
own  moods  and  fancies,  and  then  suddenly  turn 
it  on  the  accomplishment  of  some  humanitarian 
purpose  or  public  reform.  I  had  used  my  will 
selfishly  for  long  years,  and  found  I  could  not 
suddenly,  on  a  mere  impulse,  turn  it  into  '  an 
instrument  of  righteousness/  The  work  was 
all  right,  but  I  had  not  the  sort  of  will  that  goes 
with  such  work.  I  lacked  the  humble,  teachable, 
disciplined  mind,  and  therefore  nothing  I  did 
had  any  strength  and  effectiveness.  It  didn't 
convince  anyone,  and  least  of  all  myself.  In  the 
end  I  realised  that  there  was  something  in  me 
that  had  to  die,  and  that  it  could  only  die  on 
the  Cross  with  Christ.  I  knew  it  would  be  a 
slow,  piecemeal  business — a  daily  dying,  in  fact ; 
but  I  also  knew  that  it  was  worth  it  all.  And 
so  I  brought  my  old  life  to  the  Cross  and  kept  it 
there  till  every  bit  of  it  was  condemned  to  death." 
Much  futile  discussion  has  centred  round  the 
old,  deep  question  of  what  it  means  to  be  crucified 
with  Christ,  and  whether,  indeed,  such  an  idea 
is  not  entirely  alien  to  a  gospel  of  life  abundant. 
The  reconciliation  of  self-sacrifice  and  self-realisa- 
tion is  at  all  times  a  difficult  matter.  Both 
clearly  have  their  place  in  Christianity,  and  the 
profoundest  thinkers  have  failed  to  adjust  their 

J37 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

rival  claims.  But  while  the  subject  bristles 
with  inherent  difficulties,  its  root  difficulty  is 
imported  into  it  by  our  doctrinaire  attitude  to 
what  is  essentially  a  vital  issue.  We  first  define 
life  according  to  our  own  preconceived  notions, 
and  then  proceed  to  argue  that  the  ascetic  prin- 
ciple is  inimical  to  life.  We  appraise  the  opposing 
demands  of  self-realisation  and  self -surrender, 
forgetting  that  while  we  are  all  more  or  less 
qualified  to  talk  about  self-realisation,  since  we  all 
strive  to  realise  ourselves  in  one  way  or  another, 
only  those  who  have  some  experimental  know- 
ledge of  what  it  means  to  be  crucified  with  Christ 
are  competent  to  appraise  both  self-sacrifice  and 
self-realisation.  In  contending  that  Christianity 
stands,  not  for  the  suppression,  but  for  the  in- 
tensifying of  life,  we  need  first  to  be  quite  sure 
as  to  the  kind  of  life  which  Christianity  aims 
at.  Briefly,  it  is  a  life  that  presupposes  a  death 
— a  life  that  is  not  merely  a  purified  and  perfected 
edition  of  man's  natural  life,  but  a  new  birth, 
or  rather  a  resurrection.  This  resurrection  is 
not  a  negation  of  the  natural  life.  In  it  every 
worthy  characteristic  of  that  life  is  preserved 
and  transfigured  ;  yet,  in  its  totality,  it  is  not 
a  renovation,  but  a  new  creation,  life  remade 
from  its  centre.  As  the  late  Archdeacon  Wilber- 
force  phrased  it,  "  Christianity  is  not  an  old- 
Adam  renovation  society/'  Jesus  is  the  Resur- 
rection before  He  is  the  Life,  and  there  is  no 
resurrection  without  a  dying. 

138 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

And  once  that  is  granted,  the  whole  issue 
shifts  its  centre.  Having  agreed  that  Christianity 
implies  not  merely  life,  but  a  resurrection  life — 
a  rising  up  from  the  grave  of  a  dead  self — the 
only  question  that  remains  is  whether  the  process 
St.  Paul  calls  being  crucified  with  Christ  is  indeed 
the  sure  and  fruitful  way  to  the  realisation  of 
that  life  in  its  fullness.  The  answer  will  depend 
upon  whether  we  define  the  ascetic  element  in 
Christianity  as  a  deliberate  system  of  moral 
and  spiritual  self-improvement,  or  as  the  spon- 
taneous desire  of  the  redeemed  soul  to  enter 
into  the  sufferings  of  Christ,  and  of  the  poor  and 
despised  who  are  so  dear  to  His  heart,  so  that 
by  any  means  it  may  gain  a  more  intimate  fellow- 
ship with  Him.  (With  the  perverted  and  essen- 
tially pagan  conception  that  voluntary  mortifi- 
cation is  a  means  of  earning  the  Divine  favour 
we  are  not  concerned  here.)  The  majority  of 
writers  take  the  first  view.  Principal  Gar  vie, 
for  instance,  while  rightly  contending  that  "  Jesus 
calls  to  no  artificial  asceticism,  but  to  a  real 
bearing  of  the  Cross  in  fellowship  with  and 
following  of  Him,"  *  yet  defines  Christian  asceti- 
cism as  "  a  limitation  of  desire  for  the  sake  of 
the  soul's  independence/ '  f  That  asceticism  may 
and  should  be  a  mode  of  the  soul's  communion 
with  God — a  spiritual  necessity  rather  than  a 
moral  drill — does  not  seem  to  come  within  his 
purview.      "  As    the    athlete    in    training    does 

*  "  Can  We  Still  Follow  Jesus  ?  "  p.   jiq.  |  Ibid.  p.   118. 

139 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

deny  himself  pleasures  he  would  otherwise  enjoy, 
so  the  Christian  who  wants  to  be  strong  and 
brave  should  practise  a  measure  of  self-denial 
even  as  regards  lawful  enjoyments.  To  endure 
a  great  temptation  a  man  must  prepare  him- 
self by  constant  self-control ;  and  it  is  not  an 
illegitimate  asceticism  for  a  man  to  endure 
some  hardness  voluntarily,  that  he  may  be  fit  and 
able  to  withstand  when  the  evil  day  comes 
upon  him/'  * 

Such  self -discipline  has,  of  course,  its  legitimate 
place  in  life,  but  it  is  not  the  impelling  motive 
of  a  true  Christian  asceticism.  That  motive  is 
indicated  by  the  Pauline  words,  "  with  Christ." 
"  I  am  crucified  with  Christ/ '  To  be  crucified 
alone,  however  effective  it  may  be  as  a  piece  of 
moral  gymnastics,  is  a  dangerous  thing.  There 
is  nothing  more  unlovely  and,  on  a  thorough 
view,  more  ineffectual  in  the  spiritual  world 
than  the  man  who  mortifies  his  desires  with  a 
view  to  self-improvement  ;  nor  is  there  a  more 
prolific  source  of  Pharisaism  and  harshness  than 
this  type  of  self-denial.  It  narrows  the  sym- 
pathies, dries  up  the  sources  of  compassion, 
impairs  true  insight,  and  blights  every  action 
with  self-consciousness.  In  essence  it  is  pagan 
rather  than  Christian,  and  resolves  itself  into 
little  more  than  the  systematisation  of  self- 
will.  To  be  crucified  with  Christ  is  to  enter 
upon  a  life  continents  removed  from  the  bleak 

*  "  Can  We  Still  Follow  Jesus  ?  "  p.   117. 
140 


The  Cross  and  the  Altar 

existence  of  the  self-regarding  ascetic.  It  also 
is  a  discipline,  it  also  involves  a  long  and  exacting 
process  ;  but  it  is  a  discipline  informed  by  a 
great  spiritual  impulse,  a  spontaneous  movement 
of  the  soul.  There  is  no  thought  of  self-improve- 
ment, only  of  coming  into  closer  contact  with 
the  great  Lover  of  men,  and  sharing  in  some 
small  measure  His  pain  and  sore  travail,  His 
intentions  and  expectations. 

In  a  certain  village  there  lived  a  wealthy 
lady,  who  suddenly  decided  to  leave  her  fine 
old  house  and  live  for  a  whole  year  in  the 
most  ill-conditioned  cottage  on  her  estate,  taking 
the  place  of  an  old  woman  who  had  lived  and 
died  there,  using  her  broken  old  furniture,  living 
on  the  coarse,  scanty  fare  that  had  supported 
the  old  woman's  life,  wearing  clothes  as  old  and 
threadbare  as  hers  had  been,  working  all  day 
at  mending  nets  and  other  ill-paid  jobs.  Her 
neighbours  were  naturally  puzzled,  some  con- 
cluding that  she  wished  to  expiate  a  secret  crime, 
others  that  she  had  become  a  Roman  Catholic 
and  was  working  out  a  cruel  penance  imposed 
on  her  by  the  priest,  others  that  she  was  a  harm- 
less lunatic.  But  the  truth  was  quite  simple. 
Her  soul  had  suddenly  awakened,  and  she  had 
realised  with  horror  that  she  was  a  selfish,  un- 
sympathetic woman,  narrow  in  mind  and  heart, 
who  could  not  even  think  herself  into  the  position 
of  the  poor  folk  who  were  her  tenants  and  neigh- 
bours.    It  came  to  her  that  sympathy  and  love 

141 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

were  the  only  things  worth  having  ;  and  when, 
with  all  her  trying,  she  could  not  break  down 
the  barrier,  she  went  down  to  live  in  the  old 
cottage  with  the  leaking  roof  and  the  rotten 
floor,  feeling  that  no  amount  of  discomfort  and 
privation  mattered,  if  only  she  could  get  to  the 
hearts  of  her  neighbours  by  understanding  them 
from  the  inside. 

In  this  incident  we  have  a  perfect  picture 
of  Christian  asceticism — a  picture  that  appeals 
at  sight  to  the  human  heart.  To  come  face  to 
face  with  Jesus  means  to  realise  that  our  motives, 
our  sympathies,  the  very  trend  of  our  being 
are  alien  to  Him  ;  that  even  while  we  are  being 
drawn  to  Him,  a  hostile  principle  buried  deep 
in  our  lives  bars  His  way  to  us  and  ours  to  Him. 
And  as  we  let  Him  have  His  way  with  us 
and  the  links  {hat  bind  us  to  Him  are  riveted 
closer,  one  overmastering  desire  swallows  up 
all  else — the  desire  to  be  so  closely  identified 
with  Him  that  we  shall  see  the  world  through 
His  eyes,  and  that  His  mind  shall  be  ours. 
Then  we  realise  more  fully  the  nature  of 
the  gulf  that  separates  us  from  Him.  His  life  is 
symbolised  by  the  Cross  ;  ours  by  the  sceptre. 
His  heart  beats  for  all  men  ;  ours  for  a  narrow 
circle  determined  by  self.  His  intentions  and 
purposes  are  those  of  redeeming  Love ;  ours 
those  of  a  thinly  disguised  self-interest.  And 
we  recognise  there  is  only  one  way  to  union 
with  Him.     We  must  put  this  old  loveless,  self- 

142 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

centred  life  to  death  upon  a  cross  not  of  our 
own  making.  We  must  make  His  way  our  way, 
His  pain  our  pain,  His  travail  ours.  We  must 
put  ourselves  in  the  line  of  His  intentions  and 
purposes,  making  His  outlook  our  own.  That 
is  a  crucifixion — no  term  less  drastic  corresponds 
to  the  reality — and  a  rising  again.  It  is  not  a 
cold,  deliberate  system  of  self-training,  but  a 
transforming  emotion,  a  fiery  passion.  It  has 
nothing  to  do  with  stained-glass  windows,  dull 
books,  and  cramping  rules  and  regulations : 
it  is  an  adventure  of  love.  It  doubtless  involves 
dreary  days  and  back-breaking  toil — what  adven- 
ture does  not  ?  But  behind  them  lies  ever  the 
warm  movement  of  the  human  heart,  not  the 
mechanical  commands  of  the  spiritual  drill- 
sergeant.  Nor  is  it  the  experience — passionate 
enough,  but  still  "  departmental " — of  a  few 
predestined  lovers  of  the  Cross.  It  is  rather 
the  gate  of  a  life  so  wide,  a  sympathy  so  warmly 
human,  that  the  wisest  among  poets  and  artists 
and  the  most  ardent  among  philanthropists  have 
kindled  their  torches  at  its  fire.  It  is  true,  of 
course,  that  many  who  profess  to  have  been 
crucified  with  Christ  are  hard  and  narrow,  and 
that  not  a  few  who  claim  no  kind  of  contact  with 
Him  abound  in  brotherly  love.  But  if  the  Cross 
is  not  merely  an  accident,  or  a  desperate  ex- 
pedient, but  the  very  ground-plan  of  the  Universe, 
then  man  can  only  attain  to  true  love  and  tender 
compassion    as  he    identifies  himself  with   Him 

143 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

who  took  our  infirmities  and  bore  our  sicknesses 
in  His  supreme  act  of  self-giving. 

The  supposition  that  such  identification  is 
merely  a  matter  of  sorrow  and  suffering ;  that 
the  Cross  has  no  imparting  of  insight,  no  glorious 
surprises,  no  unfoldings  of  love  and  wisdom, 
no  power,  no  thrill,  no  joy  to  irradiate,  cannot 
be  tolerated  for  a  moment.  Traherne  did  well 
when  he  extolled  the  Cross  as  "  the  throne  of 
delights/ '  declaring  it  to  be  "  the  abyss  of  wonders, 
the  centre  of  desires,  the  house  of  wisdom,  the 
theatre  of  joys,  the  root  of  happiness,  and  the 
gate  of  Heaven. "  * 

For  generations  souls  of  high  mettle  have 
revolted  from  the  Cross  as  from  something  that 
contracts  human  life,  takes  the  light  out  of  the 
sun,  and  brings  the  stuffiness  of  the  cloister  into 
God's  free  and  open  world. 

Thou  hast  conquered,  O  pale  Galilean  ! 

The  world  has  grown  grey  with  Thy  breath  ! 

Much  water  has  run  under  the  bridge  since 
Swinburne  uttered  his  feverish  protest,  and 
neither  the  revolting  pagan  nor  the  discouraged 
Christian  is  quite  so  sure  that  the  "  pale  Galilean  " 
has  indeed  conquered ;  yet  the  note  of  revolt  is 
heard  wherever  a  man  is  bored  by  a  Church 
service,  or  repelled  by  an  uncongenial  presen- 
tation of  the  Gospel.  But  the  fault  is  not  with 
Jesus  and  His  Cross.     It  may  lie  in  the  service 

*  "Centuries  of  Meditation,"  pp.  39,  41. 
144 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

or  teaching,  or  it  may  lie  with  the  ignorant  or 
unsympathetic  mind  of  the  critic.  In  either 
case  the  blame  rests,  not  with  the  Cross,  but  with 
our  poor,  narrow  conception  of  it.  We  first 
deplete  the  Cross  of  that  half  of  its  content 
which  gives  colour  and  meaning  to  the  other 
half,  and  then  talk  glibly  of  "  a  positive,  virile 
Christianity "  that  has  left  the  stage  of  self- 
mortification  behind  it.  Very  slowly  does  it 
come  home  to  us  that,  with  all  our  talk  of  virility, 
we  are  not  producing  virile  character  ;  that  our 
unpruned  and  undisciplined  nature,  so  far  from 
being  the  glorious,  free,  untrammelled  thing 
we  imagine  it  to  be,  is  in  reality  a  poor  dupe 
to  its  whims  and  fancies,  its  preferences  and 
idiosyncrasies.  One  cannot  listen  to  the  con- 
versation of  even  genuinely  religious  people, 
with  its  ever-recurring  "  I  think,"  "  I  don't  hold 
with  it,"  "  it  doesn't  appeal  to  me,"  and  other 
selections  from  the  phrase-book  of  egoism,  with- 
out realising  that  we  are  not  merely  incomplete 
but  actually  ridiculous  in  our  self-importance 
and  lack  of  proportion  without  some  such  radical 
life-process  as  being  crucified  with  Christ.  The 
seriousness  with  which  we  take  our  most  ill- 
considered  views  and  ungrounded  dislikes,  the 
positive  reverence  with  which  we  handle  our 
prejudices,  the  importance  we  ascribe  to  our 
feelings  and  moods — all  these  things  would  pro- 
voke us  to  healthy  merriment,  had  we  anything 
of  that  delightful  sense  of  humour  which  always 

k  145 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

distinguished  the  saints  and  is  one  of  the  most 
powerful  of  nature's  aids  to  grace. 

The  only  way  of  escape  from  weakness  so 
undignified  and  pretensions  so  hollow — in  short, 
from  our  self-complacent  religious  mediocrity, 
is  to  let  the  Cross  break  us  and  make  us  over 
again.  Always  it  has  been  the  Cross  that  has 
made  the  priest,  the  warrior-saint.  We  cannot 
wriggle  out  of  the  logic  of  facts  by  expatiating 
upon  the  superstition  and  puerility  that  marked 
the  mediaeval  cult  of  the  Cross.  Many  of  those 
who  in  past  ages  have  made  the  Cross  their  only 
prayer-book,  manual  of  ascetics,  and  compendium 
of  theology  were  hampered  by  gross  superstition ; 
but  mediocre  or  weak  they  were  not.  Theirs 
was  a  strong,  heroic  spirit  that  laughed  at  im- 
possibilities, and  claimed  the  whole  world  for 
God.  "  When  once  the  saints  of  the  Society 
said,  '  I  will/  it  was  done,"  wrote  Father  Paul 
Ginhac,  himself  a  hero  of  the  Cross,  concerning 
the  early  Jesuits.  "  Ah,  may  God  deliver  us  from 
these  half-wills,  from  those  men  of  the  '  happy 
medium  '  who  will  and  do  not  will,  who  will  a 
certain  thing  but  not  everything.  That  is  the 
greatest  scourge  in  religion.' ' 

We  deplete  the  Cross  of  its  rich  plenitude 
of  meaning  when  we  connect  it  only  with  re- 
pentance, or  with  the  passive  virtues,  and  fail 
to  recognise  in  it  that  Tree  of  Life  out  of  which 
all  strong  and  genuine  manhood  grows.  We 
deplete  it  further  when  we  confine  it  within  the 

146 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

limits  of  the  individual  experience.  If  the 
soul  must  be  crucified  with  Christ,  so  must  the 
Church  ;  and  the  reason  why  the  Church  goes 
weak  and  halting  to-day  is  that  she  will  not 
consent  to  die.  She  clings  to  a  life  that  depends 
upon  the  suffrages  of  men,  and  in  trying  to  gain 
votes  she  has  lost  influence.  For  man,  in  spite 
of  his  blindness  and  error,  demands  from  the 
Church  not  support,  but  leadership.  Deep  down 
in  his  soul  he  expects  to  be  challenged,  and  not 
to  be  cajoled.  He  looks  for  a  God  that  answers 
by  fire  ;  for  a  Bride  of  Christ  terrible  as  an  army 
with  banners.  He  wants  to  see  the  sword  that 
pierces  to  the  marrow,  the  fan  that  thoroughly 
purges  the  threshing-floor,  the  axe  that  is  laid 
to  the  root  of  the  tree.  But  of  the  Church  it 
might  rather  be  said,  as  Dora  Greenwell  said 
of  the  Renascence,  that,  refusing  to  die,  "  it 
remained  alone." 

The  Renascence,  with  all  the  glorious  elements  it 
contained,  was  not  able  to  regenerate  the  Humanity 
it  sought  to  deify,  because  it  would  not  in  any  way 
consent  to  die,  nor  acknowledge  that  there  is  in  all  mortal 
things  a  corrupt  principle  needing  restriction,  and  even 
excision.  Therefore  "it  remained  alone,"  and  soon  passed 
into  a  heartless  self- worship  and  dilettantism,  willingly 
ignorant  of  all  man's  deeper  woes,  as  cruel  as  the  fanat- 
icism it  displaced,  and  under  some  aspects  even  more  re- 
pulsive. So  too  will  all  modern  systems  pass  into 
inanition  which  deny  or  ignore,  as  regards  spiritual  and 
moral  life,  a  truth  which  natural  life  almost  forces  us 

H7 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

to  accept  through  the  strong  analogies  it  presses  on 
our  notice  ;  the  "  necessary  death  "  through  which,  as 
through  a  gate,  all  life  needs  to  pass,  before  it  can  enter 
upon  a  new  condition  of  being,  and  failing  of  which 
it  remains  alone,  locked  up  in  the  death  of  a  merely 
seeming  life,  like  a  mummy  or  petrifaction.* 

How  little  the  Church  has  dared  to  be  crucified 
with  Christ  has  emerged  during  the  war.  When, 
in  the  early  days  of  the  war.  the  nation  thrilled 
with  a  high  ideal  and  was  open  as  never  before  to 
the  influence  of  spiritual  leadership,  the  Church 
was  content  to  be  an  echo  of  popular  patriotism, 
instead  of  lifting  that  patriotism  to  the  level  of 
Calvary.  It  had  no  message  for  the  hour  ;  it 
merely  marked  time  by  giving  a  faint  religious 
flavour  to  the  better  kind  of  newspaper  platitude. 
To  realise  this  it  is  not  necessary  to  go  far  below 
the  surface  ;  one  need  only  ask  what  the  Church 
has  done  to  Christianise  that  body  of  passionate 
indignation  which  swept  through  us  as  the  tale 
of  German  atrocities  was  unfolded.  She  has 
certainly  told  us  that  we  do  right  to  be  angry, 
and  warned  us  to  discriminate  between  righteous 
wrath  and  blind  hatred  ;  but  any  decent  moralist 
could  have  told  us  that,  and  every  sane  journalist 
has  told  us  that  over  and  over  again.  What 
we  looked  for  from  the  Church  was  to  set  beside 
the  justifiable  but  imperfect  indignation  of  the 
people  the  moral  indignation  of  those  who  see 
all  things  from  the  standpoint  of  the  Cross. 

*  "  Colloquia  Cruris,"  pp.   141-42. 
148 


The  Cross  and  the  Altar 

For  the  moral  indignation  that  springs  from 
the  Cross  is  not  merely  indignation  at  moral 
wrong.  It  is,  first  and  foremost,  a  vision  of  that 
wrong  as  directed,  not  merely  against  the  cause 
or  the  person,  the  country  or  the  Church,  to 
which  one  has  given  one's  allegiance,  but  ultim- 
ately against  the  heart  of  the  Universe  ;  against 
that  which  makes  goodness  and  truth,  love 
and  beauty,  possible ;  against  the  God  who 
loves  men  so  supremely  that  He  cares  more  for 
their  character  than  for  their  comfort.  The  man 
who  is  capable  of  the  highest  type  of  moral 
indignation  is  the  man  who  feels  human  wrong 
and  sin  as  a  hurt  to  God,  and  therefore  a  hurt 
to  himself ;  who  is  so  closely  identified  with 
God  that  nothing  can  pierce  the  Heart  of  the 
Eternal  without  piercing  his  heart  also.  Such 
indignation  involves  far  more  than  righteous 
anger  against  the  criminal  and  passionate  sym- 
pathy with  his  victims.  It  is  based  upon  the 
conviction  that  the  most  tragic  thing  in  this 
world-tragedy  is  the  fact  that  a  nation  which 
might  have  been  a  pillar  of  righteousness  and  a 
leading  partner  in  every  noble  crusade  has  become 
a  vulture-nation,  a  beast  of  prey,  a  horde  of 
vandals.  To  feel  this  as  the  darkest  blot  upon 
the  Universe,  the  deepest  anguish  to  God,  and 
the  most  bitter  shame  of  our  common  humanity, 
and  to  utter  one's  condemnation  out  of  an  intense 
personal  realisation  of  these  things,  is  to  achieve 
the  moral  indignation  that  will  strengthen,  purify 

149 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  uplift  a  nation,  where  a  lower  type  tends 
to  breed  Pharisaic  complacency. 

And  while  not  a  few  voices  from  within  the 
Church  have  sounded  this  note,  the  Church  as 
a  whole  has  adopted  the  lamentable  policy  of 
supplying  a  bowdlerised  version  of  popular  senti- 
ment, and  of  carefully  watering  down  any  con- 
ception of  patriotic  duty  which  might  clash 
with  conventional  opinion.  While  our  news- 
papers give  hospitality  to  the  utterances  of  far- 
seeing  men — prophets  .of  a  new  and  larger  patriot- 
ism— the  Church  is  still  afraid  to  express  what 
many  thoughtful  minds  in  all  political  camps 
have  accepted  years  ago.  In  this,  as  in  some 
other  respects,  the  despised  Puritans  might  read 
us  a  salutary  lesson.  At  a  time  of  grave  crisis 
these  staunch,  deep  men  were  able  to  rebuke 
and  exhort  the  nation,  and  to  influence  public 
opinion  with  an  effectiveness  which  makes  the 
Church  of  to-day  appear  tragically  impotent. 
The  reason  for  this  is  not  far  to  seek.  While 
the  Puritans  were  true  patriots  and  strong  Church- 
men, while  they  loved  England  to  the  giving 
of  their  hearts*  blood,  and  the  Church  as  the 
unconquerable  company  of  the  redeemed,  their 
outlook  was  bounded  by  neither.  They  viewed 
all  things — the  nation  and  the  Church  included — 
in  relation  to  the  Kingdom  of  God.  Their 
horizon  was  limited  only  by  His  purposes.  They 
saw  Holy  Love  enthroned  in  the  centre  of  the 
Universe,  and  out  of  that  vision  they  condemned 

150 


The  Cross  and  the  Altar 

wrong  with  an  indignation  that  impressed  even 
the  careless.  For  them  every  sin,  even  when 
its  effects  were  frustrated  on  earth,  made  the 
pillars  of  the  Universe  to  tremble,  and  every 
wrong,  though  it  failed  to  hurt  a  single  human 
being,  reverberated  in  the  pure  courts  of  Heaven. 
For  all  their  grimness  and  literalness,  it  is  they, 
not  we,  who  could  have  entered  most  deeply 
into  the  mind  of  that  anti-Puritan  mystic, 
William  Blake  :— 

A  robin  redbreast  in  a  cage 
Sets  all  heaven  in  a  rage  ; 
A  skylark  wounded  on  the  wing 
A  cherubim  doth  cease  to  sing. 

We  of  to-day  think  only  of  the  redbreast's 
misery  and  the  lark's  pain.  We  are  humanists, 
and  therefore  futile.  For  life  is  more  than 
humanism,  and  only  he  who  has  seen  wrong  as 
it  pierces  the  Heart  of  God,  and  not  merely  as 
it  makes  the  hearts  of  men  to  bleed,  can  be  a 
prophet  to  his  generation..  We  may  learn  human- 
ism at  the  crib  of  Bethlehem — and  it  is  a  Divine 
lesson,  indeed — but  the  power  that  makes  human- 
ism effective,  instils  healing  into  the  tears  of 
pity,  and  puts  a  sword  into  the  hand  of  indig- 
nation, can  only  be  got  at  the  Cross.  That 
the  Church  has  not  sought  it  there,  but  has 
been  more  concerned  to  live  with  the  crowd 
than  to  die  with  Christ,  is  the  measure  of  her 
failure. 

151 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

III 

One  of  the  most  momentous  religious  tendencies 
of  to-day  is  the  movement  towards  the  recovery 
of  the  sacramental  principle,  which  is  beginning 
to  find  its  way  even  into  the  Free  Churches. 
We  are  coming  to  recognise  that  at  the  centre 
of  our  religion  is  not  a  Cross  only,  but  an  Altar. 
The  Saviour  we  worship  is  not  merely  One  who 
once  accomplished  a  great  redeeming  Act  on 
our  behalf,  but  One  who  gives  us  day  by  day 
His  Body  and  Blood,  broken  and  poured  forth, 
that  we  may  live.  It  follows  that  the  centre 
of  our  worship  cannot  be  mere  praise  and  adora- 
tion, or  confession  and  intercession,  or  teaching 
and  inspiration;  cannot  be  anything  *  less,  indeed, 
than  united  partaking  of  the  Body  and  Blood  of 
Christ,  and  the  offering  of  our  own  bodies  and 
souls  as  a  living  sacrifice.  It  must  consist  not 
in  words,  but  in  an  act  in  which  all  the  powers 
of  the  soul  are  engaged,  and  which  is  at  once  a 
taking  and  a  giving.  Whatever  the  gulf  between 
the  sacerdotal  and  the  evangelical  interpretation 
of  that  principle,  all  who  have  a  vision  of  the 
Altar  are  agreed  as  to  its  primitive  significance. 
A  formal  celebration  of  Holy  Communion  as  a 
mere  memorial  feast  is  a  service  without  an 
Altar  ;  a  Quaker  meeting  based  upon  the  in- 
tention of  partaking  of  the  Divine  Life,  and  of 
reconsecrating  the  lives  of  the  worshippers  as  a 
pure  offering,  has  the  Altar  in  its  midst. 

*52 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

To  trace  the  revival  of  sacrament alism,  as 
distinguished  from  sacramentarianism,  to  its  roots 
and  follow  out  its  implications,  would  take  us 
far  beyond  the  range  of  our  subject.  One  thing, 
however,  must  be  emphasised.  If  the  principle  : 
No  Gospel,  no  Mass,  holds  true,  it  is  as  funda- 
mentally true  to  say  :  No  Cross,  no  Altar.  This 
means  that  only  those  who  have  accepted  the 
Cross  both  as  an  objective  fact  and  as  a  per- 
sonal experience  can  partake  of  the  Sacrament 
"  worthily."  The  Communion  is  indeed  more 
than  the  sacramentum  of  pledged  soldiers  of  the 
Cross  ;  but  unless  it  is  that  first  of  all,  it  can  be 
little  more  than  a  pious  symbol,  where  it  is  not 
a  magical  superstition.  Any  theory  of  the  Sacra- 
ment, under  whatever  theological  label  it  appears, 
which  separates  the  act  of  receiving  the  Body 
and  Blood  of  Christ  from  the  act  of  nailing  one's 
life  to  *  the  Cross,  that  the  new  priestly  life  of 
consecration  and  sacrifice  may  be  born  in  us, 
is  condemned  already.  The  new  life  can  only 
be  gained  through  the  death  of  the  old  ;  it  can 
only  be  maintained  by  the  continual  impartation 
of  Christ's  own  life  to  us.  To  disjoin  what  are 
really  two  complementary  elements  of  one  act 
is  to  misunderstand  the  nature  of  the  Gospel. 
It  is  this  violent  disjunction  that  has  alienated 
so  many  from  the  Sacrament.  They  have  come 
to  connect  everything  that  is  active,  virile  and 
heroic  in  the  Christian  life  with  the  Cross,  and 
everything  that  is  passive,  feminine  and  quietist 

l53 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

with  the  Altar.  In  reality,  the  two  are  indis- 
solubly  one.  It  is  the  Christian  soldier  who 
receives  his  viaticum  for  the  long  campaign,  not 
of  death  but  of  life  ;  it  is  the  penitent,  hungering 
soul,  comforted  and  reinforced,  who  is  ready  to 
be  crucified  daily  with  Christ.  "  It  is  only  the 
life  of  the  Incarnate  God  within  us  that  makes 
us  priests  ;  it  is  His  priesthood,  His  mediation, 
that  expresses  itself  through  us.  The  individual 
self  as  such  is  not  a  priest.  Self  can  represent 
nothing  but  self.  And  therefore  self  must  be 
killed  and  given  up  whole  and  entire,  like  the 
whole  burnt-offering  on  the  altar,  in  order  that 
there  may  be  nothing  in  us  but  Christ,  nothing 
left  in  us  but  priesthood. "  *  It  is  not  merely 
that  the  Altar  presupposes  the  Cross ;  it  is 
equally  true  that  the  Cross,  in  its  subjective 
application,  would  tend  to  breed  that  subtle 
self-exaltation  which  lurks  in  all  self-sacrifice, 
were  it  not  wedded  to  the  Altar.  It  is  not  in 
virtue  of  the  strength  we  draw  from  our  self- 
crucifixion,  but  by  our  daily  feeding  upon  a 
Life  not  our  own,  that  we  are  made  priests  unto 
God  and  men. 

From  the  men  who  have  fought  and  from  the 
men  who  face  grim  responsibilities  at  home, 
from  the  minds  of  thinkers  and  from  the  hearts 
of  the  poor,  there  comes  the  demand  for  a  form 
of  worship  which  shall  not  merely  be  an  inco- 
herent   and    unprogressive    medley    of    hymns, 

*  A.  H.  McNeile,  H  Discipleship, "  p.   116. 
154 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

prayers,  and  readings,  but  a  purposeful,  closely 
knit  procession  culminating  in  a  sacramental 
act.  Men  and  women  are  tired  of  services  which 
seem  to  them  to  lead  nowhere.  Many  especially 
who  were  nurtured  in  the  Free  Churches  crave 
for  a  devotional  service  in  which  the  minister 
— adopting  the  suggestion  of  so  convinced  a 
Free  Churchman  as  Principal  Forsyth — shall  pray 
in  the  only  position  in  which  he  too  can  truly 
worship,  that  is,  on  a  level  with,  and  facing  the 
same  way  as,  the  people.  Such  a  change  of 
position  may  seem  a  slight  matter,  but  it  sym- 
bolises a  whole  continent  of  religious  conviction 
and  feeling.  A  devotional  service  in  which  the 
minister  really  prays  simply  and  earnestly  as  one 
of  the  people  is  incompatible  with  the  literary 
type  of  prayer,  which  has  been  the  bane  of  Free 
Church  worship,  and  with  ambitious  or  pre- 
tentious sermonising,  or  rather  essay-reading. 
It  naturally  and  inevitably  leads  to  a  sacramental 
worship.  We  are  often  inclined  to  judge  the 
average  worshipper  harshly,  saying  that  he  listens 
to  rather  than  joins  in  the  prayers,  and  that  his 
only  object  in  following  the  sermon  is  to  see 
whether  the  preacher  agrees  with  him.  This 
may  be  largely  true  ;  but  as  long  as  so  many 
pulpit  prayers  invite  literary  appreciation  rather 
than  devotional  sincerity,  and  so  many-  sermons 
are  clever  statements  of  opinion,  or  attractive 
interpretations  of  the  preacher's  mood,  rather 
than  words  of  witness  or  prophecy,  so  long  will 

i55 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

this  attitude  have  some  degree  of  justification. 
In  the  end  there  is  only  one  remedy — to  make 
Holy  Communion  the  chief  Sunday  service. 

The  Altar  is  the  supreme  witness  to  the 
sovereignty  of  the  Cross  over  the  whole  of  life. 
Bunyan  introduces  the  Cross  near  the  beginning 
of  Christian's  pilgrimage,  as  the  place  where 
the  burden  of  sin  rolls  off  the  pilgrim's  back  and 
is  seen  no  more — reintroducing  it  at  later  stages 
merely  as  a  ground  of  confidence  and  a  refuge 
in  times  of  despondency  or  relapse.  But  the 
power  of  the  Cross  is  not  thus  to  be  confined. 
It  is  the  root  principle  of  our  new  life  in  God 
from  beginning  to  end — its  revealing  light  as 
well  as  its  consuming  fire,  the  secret  of  its  beauty 
as  well  as  the  source  of  its  strength.  Above  all, 
it  is  the  soul  of  prayer.  Three-fourths  of  our 
difficulties  about  prayer  would  vanish  if  we  took 
as  the  normative  type  of  prayer,  not  the  spasmodic 
cry  that  is  wrung  from  the  average  soul  in  hours 
of  distress,  nor  the  easy,  habitual  prayers  of  the 
constitutionally  pious,  or  of  those  who  were 
trained  in  a  tradition  of  daily  prayers,  but  rather 
the  prayer  that  is  specifically  Christian.  Such 
prayer  can  only  be  learnt  at  the  Cross,  and  can 
only  be  sustained  at  the  Altar.  It  is  a  profound 
and  exacting  act  of  self-giving,  and  therefore 
has  nothing  to  do  with  that  glib  devotional 
utterance  we  sometimes  call  a  "  gift  of  prayer.  " 
It  is  possible  for  a  person  thus  endowed  to  pray 
with  daily  increasing  ease  and  fervour  and  yet 

156 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

to  be  daily  slipping  farther  away  from  reality, 
because  all  the  time  he  is  praying  "  outside  his 
soul/'  as  it  were.  His  prayer  and  his  real  self 
are  curiously  disjoined,  and  the  ease  with  which 
he  glides  from  the  troubled  waters  of  mundane 
activity  into  the  calm  haven  of  devotion  conceals 
the  fatal  hiatus  from  him.  But  true  prayer 
always  comes  hard,  for  it  is  the  expression  of  the 
crucified  life.  It  is  itself  one  long  crucifixion. 
Its  strength  lies  not  in  its  liberties,  but  in  its 
restraints — in  the  long,  dumb  hours  when  the 
soul  is  held  in  dryness  and  emptiness,  until  the 
pain  of  self-knowledge  and  the  longing  for  a 
God  who  hides  Himself  dilate  the  heart  to  contain 
the  larger  revelation,  the  new  call,  which  God 
is  waiting  to  give.  Such  prayer  is  not  a  matter 
of  temperament ;  it  depends,  not  on  a  man's 
devotional  tastes,  but  on  his  willingness  to  face 
reality  and  endure  its  searching  inquisition. 

The  Altar  reminds  us  that  prayer  is  a  priestly 
act — a  sacrifice  in  which  priest  and  victim  are 
one*  To-day  we  are  groping  our  way  to  a  deeper 
recognition  of  the  nature  and  force  of  inter- 
cession ;  but  while  true  prayer  will  always  end 
in  intercession,  its  primary  motive  is  to  unite 
the  soul  with  Him  who  is  the  source  of  all  benefits. 
The  popular  objection  that  it  is  selfish  to  pray 
so  much  for  one's  own  soul  shows  how  little  we 
have  divined  the  secret  of  true  priesthood.  As 
well  say  that  it  was  selfish  of  the  woman  at 
Bethany   to   pour    the   spikenard  over   the   feet 

'57 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

of  Jesus,  instead  of  selling  it  and  giving  the 
money  to  the  poor.  A  false  altruism  is  threat- 
ening to  cut  the  very  nerve  of  true  Christian 
love.  The  great  saints  of  past  ages  did  not 
think  of  themselves,  or  of  self-improvement, 
when  they  spilt  their  hearts  as  water  unto  God ; 
they  only  thought  of  Him,  they  only  sought 
expression  for  the  deep  instinct  of  love  which 
urged  them  to  give  their  all.  And  out  of  their 
unreserved  self-giving  to  the  Lover  of  their 
souls  there  grew  a  love  of  men  beside  which  our 
present-day  philanthropy  seems  cold  and  thin. 
Our  current  conception  of  true  intercession  re- 
solves itself  into  a  putting  of  ourselves  into  our 
neighbour's  place  in  the  sight  of  God,  thinking 
of  his  sorrows,  trying  to  realise  his  difficulties, 
looking  at  things  from  his  point  of  view,  till  we 
can  pray  for  him  as  if  we  were  praying  for  our- 
selves. This  is  excellent,  of  course ;  but  it  is 
not  "  the  one  thing  needful/ '  The  priestly 
prayer  learnt  at  the  Altar  is,  first  and  foremost, 
a  putting  of  oneself,  not  in  the  place  of  one's 
neighbours,  but  in  the  place  of  Christ,  seeking 
communion  with  Him  in  His  sorrow  and  shame 
for  man's  sin,  in  His  compassion — so  different  from 
the  shallow  pity  of  our  own  hearts — and  in  His 
amazing  designs  for  man's  true  happiness.  Until 
the  soul  of  our  intercession  becomes,  not  merely 
the  repeating  of  a  list  of  names  and  needs  in  a 
spirit  of  fellow-feeling,  but  a  self-offering  to  God 
— a  crucifying,  not  merely  of  our  selfishness,  but  of 


The  Gross  and  the  Altar 

our  shallowness,  that  we  may  indeed  fill  up  what 
is  lacking  of  the  sufferings  of  Christ,  and  be  true 
priests  unto  our  brethren — it  must  remain  feeble. 
It  is  told  of  a  certain  mediaeval  saint  that 
her  reputation  for  holiness  was  so  great  that 
people  crowded  to  her,  asking  her  prayers 
for  them.  She  listened  to  their  requests,  but 
promptly  forgot  all  about  them — so  absorbed 
was  she  in  the  contemplation  of  the  Passion  of 
Christ.  Great  was  her  surprise,  therefore,  when 
every  day  brought  those  who  came  to  thank 
her  for  the  benefits  received  through  her  prayers. 
But  as  she  pondered  this  strange  thing,  she 
suddenly  understood.  She  had  been  so  closely 
united  to  the  Source  of  help  and  healing — it  would 
have  been  strange  if  none  of  it  had  overflowed 
upon  those  she  had  forgotten  for  no  selfish  reason. 
Which  thing  is  a  parable,  for  the  Church  as  well 
as  for  the  soul.  Until  we  have  the  courage  to 
restore  the  Cross  and  the  Altar  to  their  primary 
and  central  place  in  our  life,  we  shall  remain 
ineffective  among  men,  and  most  ineffective 
in  prayer.  To  regard  prayer,  as  we  so  often 
tend  to  do,  as  a  sympathetic,  or  rather  telepathic, 
exercise  used  with  altruistic  ends,  is  fatal.  It  is 
either  communion  with  God,  or  it  is  nothing ;  and 
until  our  supreme  passion  is  once  more  the  desire 
to  have  communion  with  God  in  the  love  that 
sent  Jesus  to  the  Cross,  and  in  the  Broken  Body 
and  the  Blood  outpoured  for  our  redeeming,  we 
have  not  even  begun  to  understand  Christianity. 

i59 


PART  HI 
THE  GREAT  ADVENTURE 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  NEED  FOR  AN  ADVENTUROUS  THEOLOGY 

Our  mental  habit  leads  us  to  connect  the  spirit 
of  adventure  with  action  but  deny  it  to  thought ; 
to  seek  it  in  the  Mission-field  and  scorn  to  look 
for   it   in    the   study.     That    thought   is   also    a 
risky   business   and   demands   a   stout   heart   no 
less  than  action,  is  about  the  last  thing  we  are 
willing  to  believe.     Yet  it  ought  not  to  be  very 
hard   to   realise   it  ;     in   the   sphere   of  practical 
morals,   at  any  rate,   it  is  abundantly  obvious. 
Here  is  a  man  given  over  to  self-indulgence  or 
greed,  or  to  the  lust  of  getting  on  in  the  world. 
He  is  not  a  bad  man  at  heart ;    he  is    simply 
one  of  the  thousands  who  take  the  line  of  least 
resistance,  following  their  natural  bent.     If  only 
he  would  take  time  to  think  !     One  long  look 
at  his  life  in  the  face  of  the  great  realities — love, 
honour,  death — would  suffice  to  make  a  different 
man  of  him  ;   one  honest,  brave  piece  of  thinking 
would  shatter  his  world  of  delusions  about  his 
ears.     But    he    shirks    the    task.     His    mind    is 
encrusted  with  prejudices,  his  conscience  vitiated 
by  shoddy  motives  and  petty  equivocations,  his 
emotions    strangled    by    the    fungus-growth    of 
selfishness.     To   clear   such   an   accumulation   of 

163 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age* 

moral  rubbish  away  and  determine  to  see  things 
as  they  really  are,  demands  more  courage  than 
he  can  comfortably  muster.  It  also  involves 
considerable  risk,  for  it  might  end  in  the  dis- 
covery that  in  his  deepest  heart  he  really  pre- 
ferred purity  to  self -gratification  ;  really  believed 
that  honour  was  better  than  gain,  and  a  clear 
conscience  than  attained  ambition.  And  once 
he  realised  that,  he  would  be  involved  in  a  struggle 
between  his  base  and  his  true  self  which  only 
death  could  end.  Small  wonder  that  he  flees 
thought  of  this  kind,  until  he  has  lost  the  very 
power  of  thinking. 

But  if  this  is  true  in  the  sphere  of  practical 
morals,  it  must  be  as  true  in  the  realm  of  that 
spiritual  life  which  gives  to  morality  its  highest 
significance.  For  the  spiritual  life  is  not  a 
static,  but  a  kinetic,  force.  It  is  a  history  of 
absorbing  interest  and  momentous  import.  Like 
the  moral  life,  it  demands  brave,  patient  thinking 
with  a  view  to  right  action.  In  no  sphere  is  it 
easier  to  let  reality  slip,  and  to  move  in  a  world 
of  shadows  without  knowing  it ;  nowhere  has 
self-deception  a  more  favourable  breeding-ground. 
And  it  is  one  of  the  most  important  functions 
of  theology  to  keep  the  soul  and  the  Church 
awake  to  reality,  and  to  rouse  them  anew  when 
they  have  yielded  to  the  poppy  vapour  of  self- 
delusion.  This  may  seem  quite  beside  the  mark 
to  those  who  look  upon  theology  as  merely  a 
traditional  formulation  of  belief  and  a  theoretical 

164 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

discussion  of  conflicting  views.  Such  a  theology 
has  certainly  no  vital  power  to  change  anything. 
But  if  theology  means  the  constant  re-thinking 
of  the  fundamental  realities  of  faith  in  the  light 
of  present  need  and  experience  ;  if  it  means 
the  kind  of  thinking  about  God  and  His  purposes 
in  virtue  of  which  our  spiritual  existence  is  a 
history,  and  not  a  mere  succession  of  moods  and 
emotions,  then  it  is  an  adventurous  under- 
taking, and  one  that  can  turn  worlds  upside 
down,  in  exactly  the  same  way  as  half  an 
hour's  honest  thinking  in  practical  ethics  can 
change  the  life  of  a  debauchee  or  a  money- 
grabber. 

Take  the  case  of  a  man  who  has  suddenly 
awakened  to  the  mediocrity  and  feebleness,  the 
utter  unreality,  of  his  religious  life.  He  sits 
down  to  think.  The  first  idea  that  happens  to 
float  into  his  mind  is  the  initial  affirmation  of  the 
Apostles'  Creed,  "  I  believe  in  God,  the  Father 
Almighty,  Maker  of  heaven  and  earth."  He 
knows  that,  cold  as  the  creeds  seem  to  us  to-day, 
they  express  the  most  passionate  convictions  of 
those  who  framed  them.  He  remembers  having 
been  told  in  connection  with  another  creed,  the 
Nicene,  that  in  that  day  the  very  shopkeepers 
and  artisans  discussed  the  metaphysics  of  the 
Person  of  Christ.  And  this  leads  him  to  reason 
within  himself  somewhat  after  this  fashion  : 
"  What  did  these  words  mean  to  the  men  whose 
faith  they  originally  expressed — men  so  different 

165 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

from  myself  in  a  thousand  ways,  yet  having  the 
same  deep  needs,  the  same  desires,  passions  and 
sorrows  ?  Many  of  them  died  that  this  faith 
might  be  handed  down  to  me,  so  the  least  I 
can  do  is  to  try  and  get  some  idea  of  what  it 
really  meant  to  them.  And  perhaps  this  may 
help  me  to  get  at  the  meaning  of  it  all  for  me 
to-day.  Do  I  really  believe  in  God,  the  Father 
Almighty,  Maker  of  heaven  and  earth ;  and  what 
precisely  do  I  understand  by  the  terms  '  Father ' 
and  '  Maker "  ?  And  if  I  do  believe  in  God 
as  my  Creator  and  Father,  how  about  my  life  ? 
How  is  it  that  I  am  eaten  up  with  worry  and 
anxiety,  that  I  am  afraid — yes,  '  afraid '  is 
the  word — of  everything  that  can  hurt  me  ? 
How  is  it  that  I  grasp  at  things  which  a  child 
of  the  great  Father  and  Maker  of  heaven  and 
earth  has  no  business  to  covet  at  all,  and  that 
I  am  so  easily  tempted  to  fretfulness  and  mean- 
ness ?  Perhaps  it  is  because  I  don't  really 
believe  in  Him,  after  all.  But  if  so,  what  do 
I  really  believe  ?  "  And  here  the  serious  business 
of  thinking  begins.  The  process  may  be  of  the 
simplest  and  most  elementary  kind,  and  the 
man  who  puts  himself  through  this  mill  may 
never  have  read  a  theological  treatise ;  yet 
he  is  to  that  extent  a  theologian,  and  a  far 
sounder  theologian  than  the  mere  theoretical 
expert. 


166 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

I 

Now  theology  thus  applied — and  such  an  appli- 
cation, so  far  from  belittling  the  scientific  work 
of  the  professional  theologian,  gives  it  its  true 
place  as  a  power-house  of  Christian  thought — 
is  a  great  adventure.  The  thing  we  need  to 
fear  above  all  else  is  a  "safe"  theology.  Nor 
is  the  cult  of  "  safety "  in  theological  thinking 
confined  to  definitely  orthodox  quarters.  There 
is  to-day  a  good  deal  of  theologising  in  the 
name  of  freedom  which  is  afraid  of  the 
adventurous  heart  of  Christianity,  and  shrinks 
from  antagonising  contemporary  prejudices  and 
life-habits  as  timidly  as  traditional  theolo- 
gians shrink  from  disturbing  the  uncritical  ac- 
ceptance of  "  official "  dogmas.  There  is  a 
common  type  of  theology  which  takes  a  some- 
what swaggering  attitude  towards  what  it  calls 
"  the  ghosts  of  a  dead  past,"  but  is  quite  re- 
markably meek  and  apologetic  in  the  face  of 
the  dislikes  and  prepossessions  of  an  unheroic 
present.  The  microbe  of  safety  has  always 
affected  theology,  and  what  we  are  pleased  to 
call  obscurantism  has  very  often  been  the  out- 
come, not  of  a  rigidly  conservative  conviction, 
but  of  a  frantic  desire  to  save  the  Church  at 
all  costs,  and  to  secure  historical  institutions 
against  invasion,  whether  from  critical  "  Bar- 
barians "  without  or  from  the  working  of  the 
Spirit  within.    And   still   in   many   ways,  subtle 

167 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  overt,  we  tend  to.  make  "  Safety  first  " 
our  theological  motto,  working  out  our  thought 
of  God  with  an  eye  upon  existing  institutions 
and  prevailing  prejudices,  and  so  infecting  the 
whole  life  of  the  Church  with  cowardice  and 
mediocrity. 

It  is  not  the  speculative  theologian  who  is 
most  likely  to  succumb  to  this  temptation.  He 
has  his  own  dangers  to  face.  He  is  apt  to  lose 
touch  with  the  facts  of  life,  and  to  think  in 
vacuo.  But  while  it  may  be  a  futile  thing  to 
sit  upon  the  edge  of  a  cloud  and  pretend  the 
world  does  not  exist,  no  one  could  possibly  call 
it  safe  ;  and  the  genuinely  speculative  theologian 
always  has  something  of  the  explorer's  courage 
in  his  composition.  It  is  the  teacher  who  works 
out  his  theology  with  the  Church  and  the  needs 
of  the  average  churchgoer  in  view  who  will 
most  frequently  be  tempted  to  put  safety  before 
truth,  on  the  plea  that  vital  needs  come  before 
correct  theories,  and  that  it  is  more  important 
for  the  Church  to  be  preserved  alive  than  for 
it  to  possess  the  highest  possible  conception  of 
its  function  and  message.  The  tendency  is 
always  to  work  upon  the  principle  that  "  he 
who  fights  and  runs  away  lives  to  fight  another 
day/'  and  to  remind  ourselves  that  the  Church 
that  dies  a  victim  to  its  own  ideals  exchanges  the 
chance  of  being  an  efficient,  if  somewhat  defective, 
working  force  for  the  pale  and  pathetic  halo  of 
ineffective    martyrdom.     Besides,    there    is    the 

168 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

thing  we  call  historical  continuity  to  be  con- 
sidered. To  break  historical  continuity  would  be 
not  merely  a  suicidal  but  a  blasphemous  policy, 
and  a  Church  that  adopted  an  adventurous 
theology  and  followed  it  up  by  an  equally  adven- 
turous practice  might  easily  break  that  continuity 
by  the  simple  process  of  becoming  defunct, 
since  average  humanity  is  scarcely  ripe  for  mem- 
bership in  so  uncomfortable  a  body.  That  the 
death  of  the  Church  in  its  present  form  would 
no  more  do  away  with  real  historical  continuity 
than  the  chrysalis  stage  breaks  the  continuity 
of  a  butterfly's  development,  does  not  seem  to 
occur  to  these  apostles  of  safety.  The  Church 
that  can  face  the  new  age  with  confidence  and 
power  is  not  a  Church  that  cares  about  historical 
continuity,  in  the  commonly  accepted  sense  of 
that  term,  but  a  Church  that  is  prepared  to 
die  ;  and  that  not  because  she  is  doctrinaire 
and  thinks  more  of  theories  than  of  life,  but,  on 
the  contrary,  because  of  her  passionate  belief 
in  the  only  life  worth  having — the  life  that  can 
be  crucified  and  buried  and  rise  again  on  the 
third  day.  Whenever  the  doctrine  of  the  Divine 
Adventure  which  lies  at  the  root  of  Christianity 
is  weakened  or  modified  in  the  supposed  interests 
of  life,  it  is  because  the  life  aimed  at  is  not  the 
free  life  of  the  Spirit.  True  life  cannot  be  insured 
against  "  accidents  "  by  theological  safety  devices. 
To  put  safety  first  is  to  put  life  last,  if  indeed 
there    is    any    life    left    worth    considering.     A 

169 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

system  of  safety  that  absolves  life  from  ad- 
venturing is  the  deadliest  conspiracy  against  life. 
An  interesting  study  which  appeared  in  the 
Atlantic  Monthly  a  year  or  two  back  treats  of 
this  peril  in  dramatic  form.  It  tells  of  two 
lovers  eager  to  marry,  but  held  back  by  prudential 
considerations  advanced  by  themselves  and  by 
their  respective  families.  Vague  objections  are 
made,  based  not  upon  definite  facts,  but  upon 
the  general  insecurity  of  life.  The  tacit  demand 
is  for  insurance  against  every  possible  evil  that 
might  overtake  these  young  people.  But  of  all 
that  depressing  company  one  man — the  father 
of  the  young  girl — sees  life  with  different  eyes. 
He  is  a  convict,  and  his  remarks  to  the  young 
man,  who  visits  him  in  prison  to  ask  for  the 
hand  of  his  daughter,  are  worth  quoting  : — 

"  They  haven't  the  point  of  view.  It's  life  that  is 
the  great  adventure.  Not  marriage,  not  business.  They 
are  just  chapters  in  the  book.  The  main  thing  is  to 
take  the  road  fearlessly — to  have  courage  to  live  one's 
life.  .  .  .  That  is  the  great  word.  Don't  you  see 
what  ails  your  father's  point  of  view,  and  my  wife's  ? 
One  wants  absolute  security  in  one  way  for  Ruth  ;  the 
other  wants  absolute  security  in  another  way  for  you. 
And  security — why  it's  just  the  one  thing  a  human 
being  cannot  have,  the  thing  that's  the  damnation  of 
him  if  he  gets  it  !  The  reason  it  is  so  hard  for  a  rich 
man  to  enter  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  is  that  he  has 
that  false  sense  of  security.  To  demand  it  just  dis- 
integrates a  man.     I  don't  know  why — it  does.      .     .     . 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

The  mastery  of  life  comes  with  the  knowledge  of  our 
power  to  endure.  That's  it.  You  are  safe  only  when 
you  can  stand  everything  that  can  happen  to  you. 
Thus  and  thus  only  !  Endurance  is  the  measure  of 
the  man.  .  .  .  Courage  is  security.  There  is  no 
other  kind." 

It  is  the  practical  theologian's  craving  for  a 
security  other  than  that  of  courage  to  follow 
the  guidance  of  God's  Spirit  that  has  largely 
contributed  to  the  alienation  of  thoughtful  men 
and  women  from  the  Churches.  The  theological 
terminology  of  bygone  ages,  devoid  of  real  mean- 
ing, let  alone  of  religious  value,  to  the  mind  of 
to-day,  is  retained,  not  merely  in  most  of  our 
popular  religious  teaching,  but  also  in  our  public 
worship  ;  and  the  motive  is  always  to  supply 
a  safeguard  for  "  the  deposit  of  faith,"  and  to 
preserve  a  sense  of  historical  continuity.  We  are 
told  that  to  make  any  radical  change  would 
be  to  incur  the  danger  of  losing  our  precious 
heritage  of  Christian  doctrine,  and  killing  our 
ancient  institutions.  Of  course,  there  is  danger 
— there  must  be  danger,  so  long  as  life  itself 
remains  the  superbly  dangerous  experience  it 
is — but  the  peril  is  no  greater  than  that  which 
threatened  the  Christian  heritage  when  St.  Paul 
took  the  Gospel  to  the  Gentiles,  subjecting  the 
Apostolic  tradition  to  the  influences  of  pagan 
thought,  translating  the  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom 
into  terms  of  a  world-religion,  and  planting 
the  Church  where  it  would  be  moulded  by  the 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

impact  of  Roman  institutionalism.  If  Chris- 
tianity not  only  survived  that  ordeal,  but  was 
universalised  by  it  and  planted  deep  in  the  heart 
of  mankind;  if  it  survived  the  later  ordeal  of 
Reformation  times,  emerging  from  it  with  twice- 
broken  fetters,  why  need  we  fear  to  risk  it  yet 
again  in  the  name  of  Jesus  and  His  Gospel  ? 
There  is  only  one  thing  to  fear,  indeed — the 
stagnation  and  desiccation  which  spell  death. 
If,  duped  by  our  timidity,  we  persist  in  allowing 
inadequate  conceptions  of  God  and  His  service 
to  determine  our  thought  and  worship,  antiquated 
methods  to  hamper  our  work,  and  effete  institu- 
tions to  imperil  our  souls,  the  Church  of  the  near 
future  will  be  safely — dead. 

Nor  is  theological  liberalism  the  cure  for  this 
timidity.  Theological  liberalism  may  be,  and 
sometimes  is,  as  tame  and  tepid,  as  concerned 
about  established  institutions,  and  as  afraid  of 
adventure  as  any  orthodoxy  could  be.  Even 
present-day  theological  liberalism  not  infrequently 
shows  a  concern  for  the  preservation  of  the  Church 
as  by  law  established  which  is  curiously  remin- 
iscent both  of  eighteenth-century  Rationalism 
and  of  orthodox  Moderatism.  With  a  curious 
failure  to  appreciate  the  great  fundamental  doc- 
trines of  Christianity  in  their  historical  develop- 
ment, it  often  combines  an  illogical  anxiety  to 
preserve  the  institutions  which  presuppose  them. 
Theological  liberalism  has,  in  fact,  remained 
largely  Victorian  in  its  outlook  ;  and  it  is  significant 

172 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

that  not  one  of  the  adventurous  Christian  move- 
ments of  recent  times,  such  as  the  Student  Move- 
ment, the  Free  Church  and  Anglican  Fellowships, 
the  Collegium,  etc.,  has  originated  with  theological 
liberalism.  With  hardly  any  exception,  these 
movements  have  been  inspired  by  the  representa- 
tives of  a  positive,  constructive  Christian  faith, 
centred  in  Christ  as  the  Saviour  and  Lord  of 
men,  and  in  His  Cross  as  the  symbol  of  redemption 
and  the  only  way  of  life.  It  is  not  a  liberal 
theology  which  is  our  supreme  need  to-day,  but 
a  theology  that  is  absolutely  fearless  in  inter- 
preting the  Gospel  to  our  generation,  and  in 
pressing  its  daring  consequences  home  upon  the 
conscience  of  all  Christians — a  theology,  in  short, 
that  prefers  reality  to  safety.  We  need  not  be 
astonished  when  plain  folk  view  the  modernist 
with  suspicion.  There  is,  of  course,  a  candid 
and  courageous  modernism  which  has  done  great 
service  in  theology  ;  but  we  have  had  far  too 
much  of  a  less  desirable  type  that  ranged 
itself  with  the  most  conservative  and  obscurantist 
defenders  of  antiquated  and  unspiritual  institu- 
tions, because  these  institutions  allow  a  cold, 
intellectual  modernism  to  exist  undisturbed,  but 
have  scant  tolerance  for  an  aggressive  super- 
naturalism  which  happens  to  be  profoundly 
spiritual.  Professor  Perc}^  Gardner  gives  a  shrewd 
characterisation  of  this  school  which,  while  not 
explicitly  Erastian,  lauds  the  practical  effect  of 
the    Establishment    in    maintaining   within    the 

i73 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Church  that  equable,  reasonable  and  unruffled 
atmosphere  in  which  a  liberal  theology  can 
flourish  unhindered.  "  A  limited  degree  of  State 
regulation/'  says  this  type  of  modernist,  "  keeps 
a  Church  sound  and  healthy,  saves  it  from  ex- 
cesses and  unreality,  and  secures  in  it  the  domin- 
ance of  common  sense.  An  Anglican  clergyman, 
though  he  must  keep  to  the  Liturgy,  is  very  free 
in  his  teaching  ;  he, is  responsible  in  the  long  run 
only  to  secular  Courts  which  are  very  tolerant 
in  their  interpretation  of  Church  formulae.  The 
control  of  Bishops  is  very  discreet,  and  Bishops, 
being  nominated  by  the  Prime  Minister,  are 
nearly  always  men  of  moderation  and  tact.  .  . 
In  a  time  of  interregnum,  when  religious  beliefs 
are  passing  from  one  stage  to  another,  it  is  far 
the  best  to  have  a  system  in  which  external 
regularity  and  decency  are  enforced  but  views 
are  not  investigated/ '  * 

Modernists  of  this  school  cheerfully  submit 
to  a  form  of  worship  which  for  the  unsophisticated 
layman  is  in  direct  contradiction  to  the  "  liberal  " 
doctrine  preached  from  the  pulpit,  so  long  as  the 
Church  remains  amenable  only  to  a  secular 
authority  which  stands  for  "  the  dominance  of 
common  sense/'  and  is  very  tolerant  (should 
it  not  rather  be  wholly  indifferent  ?)  in  its  inter- 
pretation of  Church  formulae.  That  to  be  safe- 
guarded by  the  theological  ignorance  and  spiritual 
indifference  of  secular  Courts,  or  by  the  discreet 

*  "  Evolution  m  Christian  Doctrine,"  pp.  228,  232,  233. 

174 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

tactfulness  of  Bishops  nominated  by  the  Crown, 
is  the  very  worst  thing  that  could  happen  to 
modernism,  or  indeed  to  any  other  type  of 
Christian  thinking  ;  that,  on  the  contrary,  the 
most  fanatical  and  prejudiced  ecclesiastical  Court, 
provided  its  interests  were  spiritual,  is  infinitely 
preferable  to  such  ■•'  tolerance/ '  does  not  seem  to 
occur  to  them. 

One  is  aware,  of  course,  that  many  modernists 
set  their  hopes  upon  the  gradual,  subterranean 
leavening  of  popular  religion  with  enlightened 
conceptions  under  cover  of  an  ecclesiastical  policy 
of  laissez  faire.  But  is  it  really  of  first  importance 
that  the  general  religious  mind  should  be  leavened 
with  a  sufficient  number  of  enlightened  concep- 
tions ?  There  is  ample  room  for  the  leavening 
process  in  Christian  teaching,  but  it  can  never 
take  the  place  of  the  more  direct  and  Apostolic 
method.  For  the  characteristic  thing  about 
Christianity  is  that  the  manner  of  receiving  it 
is  as  important  as  the  content  of  that  which  is 
received,  that  the  How  is  as  momentous  as 
the  What.  To  accept  Christianity  with  a  free, 
brave,  passionate  soul  that  is  prepared  to  witness 
to  its  profession  ^even  to  the  laying  down  of 
life  if  need  be,  and  to  make  experience  of  the 
new  way  to  the  uttermost  of  peril,  opposition 
and  contempt,  is  the  one  thing  needful,  and  not  the 
existence  of  a  system  which  renders  these  qualities 
superfluous  and,  indeed,  views  them  as  a  lapse 
from  that   "  common  sense  "    which  is  the  idol 

i75 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

of  this  type  of  modernism.  No  safeguarded 
theology,  no  amount  of  incubation  with  enlight- 
ened views  behind  the  scenes,  will  meet  the 
demands  of  an  age  which,  with  all  its  faults,  has 
come  to  realise  that  unless  religion  is  a  huge 
risk  it  is  nothing.  At  the  heart  of  the  Gospel 
is  the  Cross  of  Jesus,  and  whatever  our  theology 
may  be,  we  know  that  the  Cross  does  not  stand 
for  "  the  predominance  of  common  sense."  We 
know  that  it  was  not  to  save  the  Church  from 
"  excesses "  that  Jesus  died.  We  know  that 
the  Cross  commits  Christ's  servants  to  something 
far  other  than  u  a  peaceful  propagation  of  enlight- 
ened views "  under  the  aegis  of  an  orthodox 
liturgy  and  a  tolerant  Episcopate.  It  means, 
to  say  the  very  least,  loyalty  to  a  Captain  who 
cares  nothing  at  all  for  safety  and  everything  for 
reality.  Jesus  was  not  a  wary  and  prudent 
reformer  of  popular  religion.  He  was  the  Divine 
Prodigal  of  love,  spending  His  substance  "  riot- 
ously "  to  His  last  drop  of  blood. 


II 

An  adventurous  theology  ^vill  insist  that  this 
central  fact  of  Christianity — the  prodigal  self- 
spending  Love  of  God  and  its  demands  upon 
us — be  interpreted  in  the  Church's  formulae  and 
find  expression  in  her  worship  and  life.  It 
cannot  stop  short  of  a  declaration  of  faith  and 
a  form  of  public  worship  which  bear  clear  and 

176 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

adequate  witness  to  it.  The  traditional  creeds 
and  formulae  bear  no  such  witness.  Instead  of 
setting  forth  Jesus  and  saying,  "  God  is  like 
that !  "  they  first  define  God  the  Father  in  terms 
of  Greek  metaphysics  and  Roman  legalism,  and 
then  declare  that  the  Son  is  co-equal  with  Him. 
Nor  is  this  the  language  of  the  creeds  merely  : 
it  stands  for  a  conception  of  God  which  is  stamped 
upon  the  Church's  worship,  and  obscures  the 
meaning  of  Christianity  for  the  common  people 
from  childhood  up.  In  the  case  of  the  Church 
of  England  Prayer  Book,  revision  has  become  a 
primary  necessity  ;  and  it  is  a  matter  for  regret 
that  the  present  movement  towards  revision  is 
organised  in  the  interests  of  sacerdotal  con- 
victions, neither  evangelicals  nor  modernists  being 
apparently  concerned  about  securing  a  revision 
on  non-sacerdotal  lines.  It  is  surprising  indeed 
to  find  so  vigorous  and  thoughtful  a  representative 
of  progressive  evangelicalism  as  Mr.  Charles  E. 
Raven  expressing  the  view  that  the  movement 
towards  revision  is  untimely,  and  its  promoters 
blind  to  the  real  issues  of  the  hour,  characterising 
it  as  the  action  of  men  who  "  have  used  the 
present  as  an  occasion  for  airing  their  peculiar 
fads  instead  of  devoting  themselves  to  the  Gospel 
of  the  love  of  Jesus."  Such  a  movement,  he 
thinks,  will  contribute  nothing  to  the  ingathering 
of  the  lapsed  masses,  since  "it  is  not  the  '  hard 
sayings '  of  our  doctrines,  or  the  archaic  phrases 
of  our  liturgy,  which  drive  men  to  reject  Christ, 
m  177 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

but  the  un-Christian  and  loveless  lives  of  His 
followers."*  There  is  surely  some  confusion  here. 
In  pressing  for  a  revision  of  doctrinal  standards 
and  forms  of  worship  on  the  score  of  their  in- 
adequacy to  express  and  render  intelligible  the 
deepest  thing  in  Christianity,  we  do  not  for  a 
moment  imply  that  the  lack  of  such  re- 
vision "  drives  men  to  reject  Christ,"  but  simply 
that  it  keeps  them  from  darkening  our  church 
doors.  And  since  the  Church  was  made  for 
man,  and  a  Church  whose  Common  Prayer  ob- 
scures and  enfeebles  her  witness  to  Jesus  has 
lost  her  raison  d'etre,  we  count  it  our  duty  to 
give  ourselves  no  rest  until  our  worship  and  our 
convictions  be  in  full  accord.  To  urge  that  it 
is  our  lovelessness  that  keeps  people  from  joining 
our  fellowship  is  beside  the  mark.  Prayer-Book 
revision  cannot  be  conceived  as  hindering,  or 
even  as  retarding,  the  growth  of  love  among  us  ; 
on  the  contrary,  by  giving  us  forms  which  express 
the  fundamental  realities  of  the  Gospel,  it  would 
make  every  service  a  call  and  an  inspiration  to  love, 
instead  of  a  recital  of  dead  theological  formulae. 
The  majority  of  those  outside  the  Anglo-Catholic 
party  (as  well  as  of  many  inside  it)  who  demand 
Prayer-Book  revision  do  so  precisely  because 
they  are  striving  to  fulfil  the  law  of  love,  and 
desire  to  find  expression  for  their  deepest  con- 
victions in  public  worship. 

While  it  is  deplorably  true  that  the  loveless- 

*  "  What  think  ye  of  Christ  ? "  pp.  234-5. 
178 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

ness  which  is  our  practical  denial  of  the  Gospel 
has  misrepresented  Christ  to  thousands  who 
might  otherwise  have  become  His  disciples,  it 
is  no  less  true  that  many  children  of  the  Church 
who  have  seen  Church  life  not  at  its  worst  but  at 
its  best  are  outside  the  Church  to-day,  because 
they  found  nothing  in  her  services  and  teaching 
to  correspond  to  their  spiritual  needs.  They 
cherish  happy  memories  of  the  Christian  fellow- 
ship in  which  they  were  nurtured  ;  they  look 
back  wistfully  to  their  childhood,  with  its  warm, 
simple  faith,  its  golden  Sundays,  its  wonderful 
reverence  for  the  House  of  God.  But  though 
they  look  back  with  tender  eyes,  it  does  not 
occur  to  them  to  turn  back.  It  is  not  that  they 
have  lost  grip  of  religion.  They  are  often  pas- 
sionate advocates  of  the  Christian  ethic,  and 
in  most  cases  feel  that  there  is  something  behind 
that  ethic  which  is  even  more  vital — something 
they  cannot  formulate,  but  which  they  know 
centres  in  the  Person  of  Jesus.  They  would  like 
to  penetrate  into  that  mystery,  but  cannot  see 
for  the  life  of  them  what  the  liturgy  of  the  Church 
contributes  to  its  elucidation.  It  moves  in  a 
world  shadowy  and  remote  ;  its  language  conveys 
little  to  them.  In  the  days  of  their  youth 
they  had  accepted  the  conventional  explanation 
of  the  theological  terms  with  which  it  bristles, 
but  there  came  a  time  when  these  explanations 
were  seen  to  be  a  process  of  defining  one  unknown 
by  another.     They  ielt  themselves  caught  in  a 

179 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

vicious  circle  of  metaphors  and  abstract  terms 
having  no  relation  that  they  could  see  to  that 
central  Figure  which  seemed  so  tremendously 
alive  to  them  in  their  best  hours,  and  became 
so  dead  when  reduced  to  the  cut-and-dried 
formulae  of  Patristic  theology.  Surely  the  Church 
has  a  grave  duty  towards  such — a  duty  which 
our  inveterate  habit  of  viewing  theology  under 
the  categories  of  "  orthodox  "  and  "  heterodox  " 
has  largely  hidden  from  our  eyes.  The  first 
question  to  ask  concerning  any  dogma  of  the 
Church  is  not  whether  it  conforms,  or  does  not 
conform,  to  orthodox  standards,  but  whether 
it  serves  to  reveal  or  to  obscure  the  Figure  of 
the  Living  Christ.  For  thousands  of  willing 
souls  Christ  lies  buried  in  a  grave  of  theological 
subtleties.  It  is  for  us  to  roll  away  the  stones, 
not  to  dispute  about  the  inscriptions  upon 
them. 

Two  opposite  ideals  of  Churchmanship  have 
divided  our  leaders  into  hostile  camps,  the  con- 
troversy reaching  its  height  when  the  popularisa- 
tion of  the  results  of  critical  scholarship  made 
many  to  tremble  for  the  Ark  of  God.  One  school 
insists  upon  a  tender  regard  for  Christ's  little 
ones,  and  a  scrupulous  avoidance  of  any  state- 
ment that  would  shock  the  simple  faith  of  aged 
believers.  The  other  contends  that  consideration 
for  those  easily  offended  is  not  the  teacher's  only 
duty  ;  he  has  to  take  thought  not  merely  for 
those  within  the  Church  whose  faith  might  reel 

180 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

under  the  overthrow  of  cherished  theological 
traditions,  but  also  for  those  who  keep  aloof  from 
the  Church  because  of  its  alleged  adherence  to 
those  traditions.  It  is  not  only  towards  the 
Church  of  the  present,  but  towards  the  Church 
of  the  future,  that  he  is  responsible.  What  avails 
his  "  economy  "  of  new  conceptions,  if  in  con- 
ciliating the  old  folk  it  alienates  young  life,  and, 
indeed,  makes  Church  membership  difficult  for 
unborn  generations  ? 

Both  these  positions  have  their  justification, 
and  both  have  been  abused  by  their  defenders. 
The  solution  of  the  difficulty  lies  in  retaining  a 
right  conception  of  the  nature  of  the  Church. 
The  Church  is  not  an  association  of  amateur 
theologians  ;  it  is  a  family,  in  which  old  and 
young,  learned  and  simple,  bold  and  timid,  form 
one  organic  whole.  Its  family  character  is  its 
glory ;  there  is  nothing  of  that  sectional  or 
eclectic  atmosphere  about  it  that  makes  a  New 
Thought  meeting,  for  instance,  such  an  artificial 
and  melancholy  business.  Its  unifying  centre 
is  a  living  Person  ;  its  uniting  link  is  mutual 
love.  In  such  a  family  it  is  possible  to  achieve 
what  would  be  impossible  in  any  eclectic  sect 
or  cult — a  teaching  and  a  worship  in  which  all 
its  members  find  their  place,  and  none  is  offended 
or  wronged.  Wherever  Christ  Himself,  and  not 
a  set  of  doctrines  about  Him,  is  made  the  centre 
of  a  Church,  the  scribe  may  bring  forth  from 
his  treasury  both  the  new  and  the  old.      Such  a 

181 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Church  will  care  little  for  theological  labels,  but 
everything  for  the  maintenance  of  a  clear,  ex- 
perimental witness  to  its  Lord.  Its  theology  will 
not  be  stagnant  or  traditional,  but  neither  will 
it  be  reckless  or  flippant.  It  will  be,  in  the  truest 
sense,  an  adventurous  theology  ;  for  it  will  submit, 
not  merely  the  new,  but  the  old  also,  to  the  test 
of  the  Life  that  is  the  light  of  men.  It  will 
commit  itself  to  no  school  or  party,  but  dare  to 
follow  the  Spirit's  leading  in  its  thinking  as  well 
as  in  its  practical  work.  Theological  catchwords, 
however  "  advanced,"  are  the  stock-in-trade  of 
the  timid  and  the  mediocre.  The  true  adventurer 
of  faith  goeth  forth  not  knowing  whither  he 
goeth.  He  knows  his  Captain ;  he  does  not  ask 
to  see  the  name  of  the  road. 


Ill 

The  temptation  to  make  a  bid  for  theological 
safety  is  by  no  means  confined  to  theologians.  In 
subtler  form  it  is  found  in  quarters  where  theology 
is  somewhat  at  a  discount,  and  it  is  not  seldom 
most  effectual  when  its  presence  is  least  suspected. 
A  vivid  exemplification  of  this  tendency  is  afforded 
by  the  late  lamented  Donald  Hankey's  inimitable 
portraiture  of  an  average  layman  who  has  come 
to  the  conclusion  that  it  is  "  up  to  him  to  be 
a  Churchman.*  He  comes  to  Communion,  saying 
in  his  heart,  "  Lord  Jesus,  I  want  to  be  a  bit 

*  In  ** Faith  or  Fear?"  pp.  23-27. 
182 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

of  Thee.  I  want  to  show  a  little  bit  of  Thee 
to  the  world.  I  want  to  offer  Thee  my  body, 
to  be  a  member  of  Thy  Body,  that  it  may  show 
to  the  world  a  little  of  Thy  Spirit."  He  then 
goes  to  the  clergyman,  who  discovers  that  he  has 
never  been  baptised.  "  I'm  glad  of  this,  Padre/' 
he  says,  "  it's  a  chance  to  get  things  square.  I 
want  to  stand  up  before  you  and  my  witnesses, 
and  to  say  quite  plainly  that  I  desire  to  fight 
beneath  the  Cross,  the  standard  of  Jesus  Christ, 
that  I  want  to  be  a  member  of  His  Body,  and 
to  do  my  bit  towards  showing  Him  to  the  world. 
I  want  to  say  that  I  don't  believe  in  selfishness 
and  material  ambition,  and  that  I  do  believe  in 
goodness  and  honesty  and  love  and  freedom." 
But  when  the  clergyman  reads  to  him  the  Service 
for  Baptism  of  Such  as  be  of  Riper  Years,  he 
becomes  alarmed.  "  This  is  awfully  long-winded," 
he  says.  "  What  exactly  do  you  mean  by 
'  mystical  washing  away,'  '  spiritual  regeneration,' 
'  elect  children,'  '  everlasting  salvation,'  and  being 
'  damned  '  ?  And  do  you  really  believe  in  the 
resurrection  of  the  flesh,  because  I'm  hanged  if 
I  do."  And  when  the  clergyman  tries  to  initiate 
him  a  little  into  what  he  believes  to  be  a  reason- 
able man's  attitude  towards  those  things,  he  is 
far  from  satisfied.  "  That's  all  very  well,"  he 
objects;  "  but  here  am  I  at  the  most  important 
moment  of  my  life,  when  I  am  trying  to  make  a 
clean  start,  and  I  have  got  to  make  a  public 
confession  of  faith  with  all  sorts  of  mental  reserva- 

183 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

tions.  I  don't  like  it.  Why  can't  I  say  straight 
out  what  you  and  I  really  do  believe  ?  "  In  the 
end  he  decides  that  it  is  worth  while  to  equivocate 
a  little  in  order  to  gain  the  spiritual  fellowship 
he  so  much  desires,  and  so  this  average  man 
becomes  a  Churchman.  But  he  is  far  from  happy 
in  his  new  life.  The  Church  services  worry  him 
by  their  apparent  irrelevance  and  insincerity  ; 
the  preaching  he  hears  generally  seems  "  off 
the  point  "  ;  above  all,  the  lack  of  fellowship 
distresses  him,  and  the  extraordinary  keenness 
of  "  good  "  Churchmen  about  questions  of  ritual 
and  theology  which  seem  to  him  of  infinite  un- 
importance. 

But  while  Mr.  Hankey's  picture  is  true  to 
the  life,  his  interpretation  of  the  facts — an  inter- 
pretation characteristic  of  a  whole  school  of 
thought — is  marred  by  a  confusion  which  lands 
him  in  the  very  attitude  he  would  most  vehemently 
repudiate.  He  rightly  contends  that  if  the 
Church  is  indeed  to  be  the  Body  of  Christ  among 
men,  its  standards,  forms  of  worship,  and  rules 
of  procedure  must  be  such  as  to  express  in  simple, 
unequivocal  fashion  the  faith  and  aspiration  of 
the  average  man  who  is  not  a  theologian  or  an 
ecclesiastic,  and  who  honestly  desires  "  to  show 
a  bit  of  Jesus  to  the  world."  But  in  proceeding 
upon  the  assumption  that,  in  order  to  fulfil  this 
condition,  the  Church  must  submit  her  formularies 
and  rites  to  the  judgment  of  the  average  man, 
he  does  less  than  justice  to  both.     The  Church 

184 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

exists  not  merely,  or  even  chiefly,  for  the  average 
man  as  he  is,  but  rather  for  the  man  he  is  to 
become  through  a  long  process  of  discipleship. 
If  the  average  man  has  the  right  to  expect  his 
first  inarticulate  gropings  after  a  new  life  to 
find  expression  in  the  Church's  worship  and  teach- 
ing, have  the  saint  and  the  mystic  no  right  to 
demand  that  their  deeper  experience  should  also 
find  a  voice  in  its  witness  ?  If  the  first  crude 
intuitions  of  the  newly  awakened  must  be  reflected 
in  its  ordinances,  may  not  the  mature  disciple 
expect  a  similar  recognition  of  his  profounder 
apprehension  of  truth  ?  The  Church  is  not  a 
religious  club  for  the  average  man,  or  indeed  for 
any  other  type  of  man  ;  nor  is  it  merely  the 
organised  expression  of  the  totality  of  the  faith 
and  convictions  of  any  given  age.  It  is  a  reservoir 
filled  with  the  results  of  the  spiritual  strivings 
and  triumphs  of  two  thousand  years.  '  It  en- 
shrines an  experience  which  even  its  greatest 
saints  have  not  fully  explored  ;  and  it  calls  the 
average  man  to  that  experience,  knowing  that 
it  was  to  average  men  that  Christ  committed 
His  cause,  that  it  was  average  men  He  called  to 
drink  of  His  cup  and  be  baptised  with  His  baptism. 
Writers  of  Mr.  Hankey's  theological  leanings 
tend  to  include  under  one  category  the  average 
man's  difficulties  about  such  conceptions  as 
"mystical  washing  away,"  "spiritual  regenera- 
tion/ '  and  "  elect  children/ '  and  his  difficulties 
about   such  matters   as   the   Virgin   Birth.     But 

185 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

the  two  classes  are  in  reality  entirely  disparate. 
The  first  set  of  ideas,  while  expressed  in  a  termin- 
ology which  needs  elucidation,  represents  vital 
processes,  which  the  average  man  who  is  a  true 
disciple  has  already  experienced  in  part,  and  is 
intended  to  grow  in  day  by  day.  They  are 
therefore  of  tremendous  importance  for  him, 
even  though  they  appear  unnecessarily  puzzling 
at  this  early  stage.  To  allow  him  to  shelve  them 
on  the  very  threshold  of  discipleship  as  so 
much  technical  lumber,  would  be  a  betrayal  of 
the  teacher's  trust.  It  is  otherwise  with  the 
second  class  of  ideas.  They  presuppose  a  nurture 
in  Christian  thinking,  a  trained  sense  of  doctrinal 
values,  and  a  delicate  feeling  for  valid  traditions 
which  a  neophyte  coming  into  the  Church  straight 
from  the  outside  cannot  possibly  have.  To 
thrust  them  upon  his  unprepared  mind  at  the 
threshold  of  initiation  is  to  imperil  his  future. 
He  must  be  allowed  to  postpone  dogmatic  ques- 
tions until  he  has  grown  sufficiently  into  the 
spirit  of  Christianity  to  understand  their  im- 
port. They  presuppose  and  demand  an  atmo- 
sphere in  which  he  is  not  yet  acclimatised.  It 
is  for  want  of  recognising  this  that  so  many 
preachers  and  writers,  especially  since  the  war, 
have  been  betrayed  into  an  ill-considered  and 
almost  hysterical  demand  for  the  removal  of 
all  dogmatic  formulations  from  the  Church's 
creeds  and  worship.  Such  a  demand  is  futile. 
Doctrinal  statement  is  an  intellectual  necessity  ; 

186 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

and  if  the  average  man  is  repelled  by  it,  the 
obvious  remedy,  and  indeed  the  only  true  wisdom, 
is  to  make  it  clear  to  him  that  the  consideration 
of  dogmatic  questions  belongs  to  a  later  stage 
of  his  development.  To  convince  him  of  this 
may  be  difficult ;  but  since  when  has  the  Church 
been  commissioned  to  avoid  the  path  of  difficulty, 
and  to  aim  at  securing  herself  against  the  risk 
of  being  misunderstood  ?  The  average  man  will 
probably  not  relish  being  told  to  postpone  his 
dogmatic  investigations,  and  take  the  suggestion 
as  yet  another  proof  of  the  incurable  sophistry 
of  a  clerical  caste.  Well — that  must  be  borne 
with  equanimity.  A  tone  of  superiority  is  cer- 
tainly out  of  place.  After  all,  few  of  us  can  aspire 
to  be  more  than  average  men,  or  rather,  there  is 
fortunately  no  such  thing  as  the  monstrosity 
labelled  "  the  average  man."  Each  man's  ap- 
proach to  Christianity  is  peculiar  to  himself, 
and  each  has  his  own  contribution  to  bring  to 
the  common  stock  of  Christian  thinking  and 
living.  But  using  the  term  in  its  conventional 
signification  to  denote  the  man  who  comes 
to  the  Christian  life  from  the  outside  with 
neither  training  nor  inheritance  of  mature  tra- 
ditions to  aid  him,  we  must  not  allow  our  sym- 
pathy to  blind  us  to  our  duty.  Our  duty  is  not 
to  vindicate  ourselves  at  every  step  to  his  im- 
mature judgment,  but  to  impress  it  upon  him 
in  all  brotherliness  and  humility  that  in  joining 
the  Church  he  has  committed  himself  to  a  fellow- 

187 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

ship  of  instruction  as  well  as  to  a  fellowship  of 
service,  and  that  his  vow  of  discipleship  pledges 
him  to  seek  a  growing  apprehension  of  Divine 
truth. 

IV 

As  we  have  seen  already,  it  would  be  disastrous 
if  the  new  and  welcome  emphasis  upon  disciple- 
ship were  construed  by  the  Church  as  a  substitute 
for  the  duty  of  working  out  a  theology  as  vital 
and  relevant  to  the  thought  of  our  age  as  the 
theology  of  the  Nicene  Fathers  was  to  theirs. 
To-day  as  never  before,  the  Church  realises  the 
difficulty  of  such  a  task,  and  on  every  hand  she 
is  being  betrayed  into  the  vicious  process  of 
"  marking  time,"  on  the  plea  that  the  moral 
and  spiritual  demands  of  discipleship  and  the 
urgency  of  social  reform  have  prior  claims  upon 
her  energy.  But  that  is  a  fatal  policy,  and  will 
not  stand  examination  for  a  moment.  True 
discipleship  carries  within  itself  the  imperative 
demand  for  that  new  thought  of  God  we  have 
discussed  elsewhere,  and  no  amount  of  social 
activity  can  reconcile  men  of  to-day  to  the  fact 
that  the  Church  is  shirking  her  specific  business. 
Men  everywhere  are  thinking  about  God  as  they 
have  never  thought  before,  and  are  more  impatient 
and  resentful  than  ever  they  were  before  against 
a  Church  that  refuses  to  address  herself  to  the 
issues  which  perplex  them,  and  tries  to  put  them 
off   with   the   cut-and-dried   formulae   of   bygone 

1 88 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

ages,  or  with  the  specious  excuse  that  personal 
holiness  or  social  service  is  of  far  more  immediate 
importance.  We  need  a  race  of  Christian  teachers 
and  preachers  who  are  not  afraid  to  go  behind 
the  creeds  to  the  New  Testament  and  the  collec- 
tive Christian  consciousness,  and  to  work  through 
the  fundamental  facts  and  conceptions  of  Chris- 
tianity, treating  them  as  living  questions,  and 
not  as  matters  which  the  fourth  century  has 
settled  for  all  the  ages  to  come.  We  want  a 
theology  that  has  due  reverence  both  for  the 
past  and  for  the  present,  but  which  is  neither 
antiquarian  nor  ephemeral — a  theology  born  of 
personal  vision  and  insight,  yet  never  merely 
subjective  because  rooted  deep  in  the  history 
of  the  Church's  growing  initiation  into  the  truth. 
It  is  only  as  we  are  striving  after  such  a  theology 
ourselves  and,  fearlessly  facing  the  original  prob- 
lems of  Christianity,  seek  to  interpret  the  historical 
creeds  afresh  in  the  light  of  a  new  age,  that  we 
may,  with  a  clear  conscience,  ask  the  average 
man  to  postpone  his  own  consideration  of  these 
matters  to  a  later  stage.  And  it  is  because  the 
average  man  suspects  that  our  advice  to  him  is 
merely  a  subterfuge  to  cover  our  own  intellectual 
laziness  and  timidity,  if  not  downright  incom- 
petence, that  he  refuses  to  accept  it.  It  is  an 
authentic  Christian  instinct  that  bids  us  put 
discipleship,  and  not  assent  to  dogma,  in  the 
forefront  ;  but  the  moment  we  acknowledge  that 
it  is  a  man's  personal  allegiance  to  Christ  as  his 

189 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Lord  and  Saviour,  and  not  his  theology,  that  is 
of  primary  importance,  we  thereby  pledge  our- 
selves to  reconstruct  our  theology,  and  re-interpret 
the  Church's  creed  in  accordance  with  this  central 
conviction.  In  other  words,  we  put  ourselves 
under  solemn  obligation  to  take  our  Lord's  words, 
"  He  that  hath  seen  Me,  hath  seen  the  Father," 
seriously,  making  it  the  fundamental  axiom  of 
our  theological  reconstruction,  and  seeking  to 
interpret  God  to  the  mind  of  our  age,  not  in 
terms  of  Greek  metaphysics,  but  in  terms  of 
Jesus  Christ. 

This  takes  us  back  to  the  neglected  truism 
that  the  teaching  function  of  the  Church  is 
essential  to  her  very  existence.  Unless  that 
function  is  recovered  speedily,  she  will  find 
herself  plunged  into  endless  difficulties  during 
the  period  of  reconstruction  now  before  us.  She 
will  soon  be  confronted  with  men  who  have  had 
a  vital  religious  experience  in  the  trenches,  and 
who  found  in  the  camp  services  something  that 
really  corresponded  to  that  experience — some- 
thing they  can  understand  and  appreciate  and 
feel — in  sharp  contrast  to  the  dull,  unintelligible, 
decorous  services  they  yawned  through  (or  avoided) 
at  home.  Many  of  these  men  will  wish  to  connect 
themselves  more  closely  with  the  Church,  and 
this  will  imply  a  legitimate  demand  for  a  change 
in  her  services.  But  woe  unto  us  if  we  interpret 
that  demand  as  a  call  to  make  our  services  as 
superficially  attractive  and  intellectually  thread- 

190 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

bare  as  the  men  find  agreeable  at  this  initial 
stage.  The  first  thing  to  do  is  to  make  them 
realise  that  Christianity  is  a  bigger  thing  than 
they  thought,  that  it  takes  long  growing  into, 
and  that  the  things  they  understand  and  care 
for  least  now  may  prove  a  year  or  two  hence  to 
meet  their  deepest  needs,  and  fit  their  most  vital 
instincts  as  the  key  fits  the  lock.  Christianity 
exists  to  make  the  average  man  something  far 
other  than  average  ;  to  make  of  him  a  saint, 
a  mystic,  an  experimental  believer,  a  priestly 
intercessor — something,  in  short,  that  shall  in 
very  deed  "  show  a  bit  of  Christ  to  the  world/ ' 
One  of  the  outstanding  marks  of  vital  Christianity 
is  its  power  to  confer  upon  apparently  common- 
place and  poorly  educated  people  the  distinction 
of  a  penetrative  spiritual  intelligence.  Every 
now  and  again  one  meets  in  crowded  city  streets, 
as  well  as  in  far-away  mountain  glens,  humble 
toilers  who,  in  plain  and  homely  speech,  discourse 
upon  the  things  of  the  Spirit  with  a  breadth  of 
outlook  and  a  keenness  of  discernment  that  are 
at  once  an  inspiration  and  a  rebuke.  Without 
knowing  it,  they  have  by  long  and  patient  ponder- 
ing attained  to  a  degree  of  mental  concentration 
and  a  clarity  of  spiritual  perception  which  many 
a  highly  educated  man  might  envy.  Few  of 
them  have  ever  opened  a  learned  book,  yet  they 
are  skilled  dialecticians  of  the  soul,  deep  seers 
into  Eternity  ;  and  many  a  scholarly  Apollos 
has  gone  to  school  to  some  illuminated  Aquila 

191 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  Priscilla,  and  received  his  degree  in  Divine 
philosophy  at  their ,  toil-worn  hands. 

The  Church  is  not  merely  a  kindly  spiritual 
home  for  average  men,  providing  the  sort  of 
services  they  can  appreciate,  the  sort  of  teaching 
they  can  understand,  and  the  sort  of  fellowship 
that  makes  Church  life  attractive  for  them.  She 
ought  to  meet  every  legitimate  need — it  is 
especially  to  her  shame  that  she  has  so  largely 
failed  to  create  that  warm  atmosphere  of  fellow- 
ship for  which  men  rightly  crave — but  her  supreme 
function  is  not  so  much  to  satisfy  felt  needs  as  to 
open  men's  eyes  to  the  deeper  needs  of  which 
they  have  hitherto  been  unconscious.  It  is  her 
duty  to  tell  them  that  it  is  not  by  the  homely 
kindness  and  comradeship  that  is  already  char- 
acteristic of  them — beautiful  though  that  be — 
but  by  the  deeper,  sacrificial  communion  of  the 
broken  Body  and  the  shed  Blood  that  they  will 
become  true  soldiers  of  Jesus  Christ  and  builders 
of  His  Kingdom.  If  she  has  hitherto  failed 
through  ignoring  the  average  man,  she  is  threaten- 
ing to  fail  once  more  at  this  critical  hour  by 
sinking  to  his  level.  There  are  signs  on  every 
hand  that,  in  her  anxiety  to  win  him  at  all  costs, 
she  is  being  betrayed  into  giving  him  the  free 
and  easy  sing-song,  the  slipshod  and  offensively 
familiar  prayer,  the  cheap,  crude,  slangy  sermon, 
when  she  should  be  bringing  to  him  the  sanctuary, 
the  altar,  the  subduing,  recreating  mystery  of 
godliness  by  which  men  live  and  grow  into  the 

192 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

likeness  of  God.  Nothing  is  gained  by  the 
growing  custom  of  turning  the  mysteries  of  faith 
into  the  subject  of  a  flippant  "  undress  "  debate, 
or  of  a  much-placarded  sensational  sermon.  We 
may  imagine  that  by  so  doing  we  are  liberating 
them  from  their  hampering  crust  of  conventionality 
and  superstitious  reverence ;  in  reality,  we  are 
only  cheapening  and  vulgarising  them.  To  study 
the  titles  of  certain  popular  religious  books  and 
pamphlets,  or  the  placards  which  disgrace  many 
a  church  door,  is  to  be  haunted  by  the  suspicion 
that,  in  the  vigour  of  our  new  crusade  for  reaching 
the  average  man,  we  are  losing  our  sense  of  the 
sanctity  of  sacred  things  without  gaining  in  either 
honesty  or  influence.  Do  we  really  imagine  that 
such  mysteries  as  the  Incarnation,  the  Divinity 
of  Christ,  or  the  Life  Beyond  become  less  difficult 
and  more  convincing  by  being  trafficked  with  in 
the  market-place  and  fingered  by  every  passer- 
by, or  that  intellectual  honesty  and  courage  are 
promoted  by  such  a  course  ?  One's  experience 
of  such  methods  would  rather  lead  one  to  say 
that  nothing  could  more  effectively  prevent 
honest  thinking  and  fearless  investigation  than 
such  a  procedure.  The  average  man,  after  listen- 
ing to  an  address  in  which,  say,  the  question  of 
the  Virgin  Birth  is  disposed  of  in  a  smart,  gaily 
iconoclastic  manner,  may  be  agreeably  impressed 
by  the  fact  that,  after  all,  the  parson  seems  to 
think  very  much  the  same  as  he  himself  does  ; 
but  it  is  extremely  unlikely  that  such  a  sermon 
n  j  93 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

will  induce  him  to  approach  the  Incarnation 
one  whit  more  thoughtfully  and  honestly  than 
before — the  likelihood  is  that  he  will  in  the  future 
approach  it  far  less  honestly. 

Let  us  make  no  mistake.  We  cannot  hope 
to  win  a  new  generation  by  pandering  to  its 
prejudices  and  immaturities.  Are  we  really  pre- 
pared to  maintain  that  St.  Paul  would  have 
captured  the  world  for  Christ  more  surely  and 
thoroughly  if  he  had  interpreted  the  Gospel  in 
such  a  way  as  not  to  make  it  a  stumbling-block 
to  the  Jews  and  foolishness  to  the  Greeks  ? 
And  if  not,  why  do  we  imagine  that  we  shall  be 
more  successful  with  a  policy  of  accommodation 
than  he  would  have  been  ?  After  all,  however 
sorely  our  creeds  need  re-interpreting  and  our 
theology  reshaping,  our  first  mission  is  to  change 
not  theologies  but  men.  A  thoroughly  shallow, 
selfish,  carnal  man  can  accept  an  enlightened 
theology ;  but  no  man  in  whom  a  great  change 
has  not  taken  place  can  accept  a  Gospel  that 
bids  him  forsake  all  he  has  and  take  up  his  cross. 
For  one  man  who  rejects  Christianity  because 
he  misunderstands  it,  ten  reject  it  because  they 
understand  it  too  well — because  they  know  it 
is  a  call  to  the  selfless  and  sacrificial  life.  Our 
first  concern  is  with  the  Gospel ;  and  our  theology 
will  be  adventurous  precisely  in  proportion  as  it 
is  the  outcome  of  our  passion  for  a  Gospel  which 
is  neither  calmly  academical,  nor  sturdily 
"  average,"    but    a    dynamic,    subversive,    mys- 

i94 


Need  for  an  Adventurous  Theology 

terious,  overwhelming  force  that  seeks  the  salva- 
tion of  the  cultured  eclectic  and  the  plain  average 
man  alike  by  bringing  a  sword  before  it  brings 
peace,  laying  the  soul's  citadel  waste  before 
building  it  again,  and  making  life  to  come  by 
the  gateway  of  death. 


195 


CHAPTER    VIII 

THE   CALL    FOR   ADVENTUROUS    DISCIPLESHIP 

We  are  accustomed  to  say  that  uncertainty  is 
the  essence  of  true  adventure,  and  that  the 
Christian  adventure  is  no  exception  to  this  rule. 
But  while  it  is  true  that  the  man  who  has  com- 
mitted himself  wholly  to  God  has  committed 
himself  to  more  than  he  knows,  the  uncertainty 
belongs  to  the  way,  and  not  to  the  end,  of  his 
pilgrimage.  It  is  no  part  of  the  God-intended 
discipline  of  Christian  knights-errant  to  lack  a 
true  vision  of  Him  who  is  their  goal.  That 
vision  may  be  brief  as  a  lightning  flash  ;  the 
soul  may  pay  for  one  brilliant  moment  of  seeing 
by  long  years  of  obscure  night.  Yet  it  is  not 
the  darkness  of  the  way,  but  the  brightness  of 
the  vision,  that  makes  the  Christian  adventurer. 
What  the  soul  has  once  truly  seen  it  can  never 
unsee,  and  our  fleeting  moments  of  spiritual 
lucidity  give  us  the  light  whereby  we  walk  all 
the  days  of  our  life.  It  is  the  characteristic 
vice  of  a  sentimental  religious  romanticism  to 
invest  the  hardness  and  hazard  of  the  pilgrim's 
way  with  an  entirely  false  significance,  and  thus 
to  throw  the  whole  conception  of  pilgrimage 
out  of  focus.     To  lose  one's  bearings  or  to  sustain 

1 96 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

wounds  in  the  Christian  pilgrimage  has  no  more 
value,  taken  by  itself,  than  the  strayings  and 
tumbles  of  a  spirited  boy  out  on  a  holiday  ramble ; 
and  so  long  as  the  would-be  adventurer  of  the 
Spirit  remains  preoccupied  with  the  twists  and 
turns  of  the  road,  the  real  adventure  has  not 
so  much  as  begun.  He  who  is  the  Captain  of 
our  salvation,  and  therefore  Himself  the  Great 
Adventurer,  had  very  little  to  say  concerning 
the  piquant  possibilities  and  thrilling  risks  of 
the  way.  Drawn  by  what  He  saw  before  Him 
in  remorseless  lucidity  of  vision,  He  set  His  face 
to  go  to  Jerusalem;  speaking  now  and  then  of 
the  Cross  that  awaited  Him,  but  hardly  at  all 
of  the  inconveniences  and  hardships  of  the  road 
that  led  thither,  and  providing  no  foundation 
whatever  for  the  romantic  embroidery  with 
which  a  certain  school  of  religious  litterateurs 
has  tricked  out  the.  way  of  the  Cross.  He  chose 
as  His  disciples  men  who  bore  not  the  faintest 
resemblance  to  the  flushed,  exalted  figures  which 
these  writers  depict  for  us.  Blunt,  straight  men 
they  were;  immune,  indeed,  from  the  theological 
and  ecclesiastical  conventions  of  Scribes  and 
Pharisees,  and  from  the  bitter  nationalism  of 
the  Judaeans,  yet  possessing  all  the  prejudices 
and  conventions  of  their  own  class,  and  burdened 
with  the  heavy,  lumbering  minds  of  men  put 
early  to  hard  and  monotonous  toil.  They  fol- 
lowed Him  blunderingly  and  blindly,  making 
every   kind   of   mistake   except   the   mistake   of 

197 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

romanticism,  hanging  back  at  every  unexpected 
turning,  and  impelled  to  go  on  only  by  their 
deep-rooted  devotion  to  their  Leader.  And  when 
Christ  had  risen,  and  the  greatest  of  Apostles 
was  born  "  out  of  due  time,"  it  was  not  a  rapt 
visionary,  a  mystic  poet,  a  graceful  knight- 
errant  who  won  for  Christianity  a  world-wide 
empire,  but  one  Saul,  a  Pharisee,  cradled  in  the 
most  cramping  system  of  traditions  and  con- 
ventions, a  typical  citizen  of  his  world,  combining 
the  forensic  temper  of  the  Roman  with  the 
argumentative  genius  of  the  Greek  and  still 
remaining  a  Hebrew  of  the  Hebrews. 

Our  first  step,  then,  must  be  to  recognise 
that  the  essential  thing  about  the  Christian 
adventure  is  not  the  element  of  uncertainty 
(though  uncertainty  always  plays  a  large  and 
important  disciplinary  role  in  it),  but  the  adven- 
turer's personal  vision  of  God — a  vision  fleeting, 
may  be,  and  all  too  rare  ;  partial,  certainly,  and 
needing  much  constant  correction  and  enlarge- 
ment ;  but  always  authentic,  dynamic,  indelible. 
And  having  cleared  our  minds  of  the  sentimental 
and  romantic  catch-phrases  that  go  to  obscure 
the  central  reality  of  the  Great  Adventure,  we 
may  profitably  interrogate  ourselves  concerning 
our  reluctance  to  embark  upon  it.  True,  the 
merely  romantic  interpretation  of  Christianity 
stirs  a  hidden  chord  in  many,  and  not  least  often 
in  the  most  unlikely  quarters.  It  is  the  timid, 
middle-aged     soul,    fettered     by    dreary    routine 

198 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

and  weakened  by  disillusionment,  that  is  often 
most    easily    stirred    by    the    note    of    romantic 
adventure.     The  unquenchable  longing  to  escape 
from   a   machine-driven   existence   asserts   itself, 
and    though    the    enchained    soul    knows    itself 
impotent    to    follow    the    call    to    freedom,    that 
bitter    conviction    only    goes    to    intensify    the 
allurement  of  that  call.     But  when  the  trappings 
and  romanticisms  are  discarded,  and  the  Great 
Adventure   presented   in    its   original   form,    the 
response   is   wanting.     It    seems   too   much   like 
an  invitation  to  exchange  a  life  of  dreary  security 
and  comfort  for  a  life  of  equally  dreary  risk  and 
discomfort.     So  long  as  the  religious  romanticist 
has  the  word,  the  adventure  presents    itself   as 
an   attractive   pursuit,   with    just   that   spice   of 
danger  that  is  man's  eternal  lure.     But  seen  in 
the   dry   light   of   truth,    what   appeared   as   an 
agreeably    stimulating    element    of    risk    resolves 
itself    into    a    depressing    certainty    of    wounds, 
shame  and  loss.     And  while  we  have  learnt  to 
disregard  pain  and  the  loss  of  life  itself  on  the 
field  of  earthly  battle,  we  have  not  yet  learnt 
"  to  give  and  not  to  count  the  cost,  to  fight  and 
not  to  heed  the  wounds,  to  toil  and  not  to  seek 
for  rest,  to  labour  and  to  look  for   no   reward  " 
in  the  Christian  conflict.     In  the  realm  of  spirit 
we  remain  enslaved  by  our  craze  for  automatic 
safety  devices,  and  our  present-day  instinct  for 
corporateness  adds  one  more  such  safety  device 
to  our  already  formidable  outfit. 

199 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 


That  the  new  cult  of  the  corporate  Christian 
life  represents  a  valid  demand,  need  not  be  empha- 
sised ;  but  when,  as  is  so  frequently  the  case,  it  is 
coupled  with  a  call  to  adventure,  it  is  time  to  stop 
and  think.  There  is  such  a  thing,  certainly,  as  a 
corporate  adventure  ;  if  the  soul  must  be  adven- 
turous, so  must  the  Church.  But  the  corporate 
experience  rests  upon  the  individual  experience, 
and  to  bracket  the  two  as  equally  important  and 
primary  is  sheer  confusion.  The  first  belongs 
to  the  esse  of  the  Christian  life ;  the  second 
merely  to  its  bene  esse.  That  the  soul  should 
make  the  great  adventure  is  absolutely  essential ; 
that  it  should  discover  its  relation  to  the  whole 
Body  of  Christ  is  most  important  for  a  true  in- 
terpretation of  that  adventure,  and  indeed  neces- 
sary for  the  working  out  of  its  implications ; 
but  essential  it  is  not,  and  wherever  the  initial 
adventure  has  not  been  made,  the  corporate 
sense  becomes  a  source  of  weakness  and  self- 
deception.  It  is  in  that  case  merely  the  religious 
form  of  that  instinctive  gregariousness  which  is 
man's  greatest  handicap  in  the  search  for  truth. 
In  first  equating  the  corporate  sense  with  in- 
dividual vision  and  then  construing  the  corporate 
life  as  a  state  of  club-gregariousness  rather  than 
as  membership  in  the  family  of  God,  we  lose  the 
true  idea  both  of  spiritual  personality  and  of 
spiritual  fellowship.     The  call  to  a  closer  realisa- 

200 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

tion  of  fellowship  is  sorely  needed,  but  it  is 
meaningless  except  as  addressed  to  those  who 
are  already  adventurers  of  faith. 

We  may  seek  to  brush  this  aside  as  a  return 
to  individualism,  but  we  do  not  get  rid  of  an 
inconvenient  fact  by  labelling  it  with  a  discredited 
term.  If  the  Church  is  founded  upon  the  fact 
of  Redemption  and  of  man's  response  to  it,  it 
is  founded  upon  the  individual  personality.  Here 
lies  the  fundamental  difference  between  the 
Church  and  an  army.  The  individual  soldier 
is  a  unit  in  the  army  ;  but  the  individual  Christian, 
while  of  course  being  a  unit  in  the  Church,  is 
something  far  more  than  a  unit.  Wherever  a 
soul  has  entered  into  true  fellowship  with  the 
Father  of  spirits,  thinking  the  thoughts  of  God, 
identifying  itself  with  His  purposes,  surrendering 
itself  to  His  guidance,  there  is  potentially  the 
Church.  "  One  person  worships  God,  and  no 
increase  of  numbers,  no  consecrated  building  or 
large  assembly  can  add  anything.  ...  A 
humble  heart  lifted  anywhere  in  the  name  of 
Christ  meets  with  God,  and  enjoys  the  fellow- 
ship from  which  all  other  fellowship  should  pro- 
ceed/' *  This  can  only  be  deprecated  as  in- 
dividualism if  we  choose  to  define  the  individual 
in  eighteenth-century  fashion  as  a  self-contained 
and  isolated  unit.  But  surely  it  is  high  time 
for  that  phantom  to  go  the  way  of  all  mythical 
lumber.     When  we  speak  of  the  individual,  we 

*  J.   Oman,   "Vision  and  Authority,"  p.   132. 
201 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

mean  the  individual  hi  his  place  amid  his  fellows. 
And  if  we  persist  in  imagining  that  corporate  life 
is  destructive  of  individuality,  or  rather  that  it 
demands  the  voluntary  sacrifice  of  a  man's 
individual  life  for  the  good  of  the  community, 
it  is  because  we  tend  to  assign  a  purely  biological 
significance  to  the  unity  of  mankind,  whereas 
its  true  significance  is  spiritual.  It  is  a  unity 
of  individuals  who  are  meant  to  know  and  under- 
stand each  other,  and  to  live  in  spiritual  inter- 
communication. In  such  a  community  the  in- 
dividual is  not  a  means  but  an  end  ;  it  is  only 
as  each  member  is  a  complete  and  virile  personality 
that  he  is  able  to  influence  his  fellow-members 
and  be  influenced  by  them.  Where  individual 
development  is  sacrificed,  there  can  be  no  question 
of  influence,  but  only  of  hypnotism  and  obsession. 
In  such  a  society  the  strongest  personalities 
appear  to  dominate  the  rest,  but  in  reality  both 
strong  and  weak  are  dominated  by  the  crowd- 
spirit,  the  community  degenerating  into  the 
herd. 

It  is  here  that  the  application  of  war  metaphors 
to  the  conception  of  the  Church  has  worked  much 
havoc.  Such  metaphors  have  of  course  a  limited 
validity.  It  is  obviously  true  that  the  Church 
should  be  a  warrior  Church,  that  her  members 
should  give  their  best  to  a  common  cause  without 
a  thought  to  safety  or  an  eye  to  reward,  and  that 
she  cannot  afford  to  sit  at  ease  so  long  as  the 
forces  of  evil  are  arrayed  against  all  that  makes 

202 


Call  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

life  noble,  pure  and  lovely.  But  when  we  press 
the  metaphor  beyond  these  limits,  pour  contempt 
upon  the  inward  and  individual  significance  of 
Christianity,  sneer  at  "  those  who  are  only  con- 
cerned with  saving  their  own  miserable  little 
souls/ '  and  lay  it  down  that  the  Christian  soldier 
is  only  a  unit  in  a  great  army,  whose  business  it 
is  not  to  worry  about  his  apprehension  of  things 
unseen,  but  simply  to  take  his  orders  and  "  do 
his  bit,"  we  are  introducing  a  confusion  which,  in 
the  name  of  a  more  virile  Christianity,  will  swamp 
what  little  Christianity  we  have.  The  true 
soldier's  courage  is  a  most  noble  and  wonderful 
thing,  but  behind  it  lies  a  wave  of  patriotism 
that  bears  the  whole  nation  upon  its  crest.  When 
the  soldier  goes  to  battle  he  goes  as  one  of  a  com- 
pany, or  as  the  leader  of  a  company.  As  he  con- 
tributes the  treasure  of  his  courage  to  the  common 
stock,  it  flows  back  to  him  enriched  by  the  courage 
of  every  brave  man  who  fights  beside  him.  But 
the  '  Christian  adventure  is,  in  its  initial  and 
determining  stage,  a  lonely  business ;  and  the 
Christian  fellowship  we  call  the  Church  helps  a 
man,  and  is  helped  by  him,  precisely  to  the  extent 
to  which  his  deepest  experience  has  been  "  a 
flight  of  the  alone  to  the  Alone." 

The  whole  spiritual  history  of  mankind  is  a 
commentary  upon  this  axiom.  The  world's  great 
spiritual  leaders,  healers  and  comforters  have 
ever  been  those  who  derived  their  inspiration, 
not'  from  the  psychological  stimulus  of  crowds, 

203 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

but  from  the  mountain-solitudes  of  communion 
with  the  Eternal.  Such  were  the  best  repre- 
sentatives of  mediaeval  sainthood.  There  is  little 
about  these  gaunt  and  outre  ascetics  to  commend 
them  to  our  practical  religious  sense ;  yet,  even 
while  we  dispose  of  them  with  such  ready-made 
phrases  as  "  morbid  asceticism, "  "  exaggerated 
emotions/'  "  distorted  outlook, "  and  so  forth, 
we  are  haunted  by  the  suspicion  that  they  suc- 
ceeded where  we  fail,  that  their  lives  had  a 
force,  a  "  prick,"  a  sheer  palpable  efficiency 
which  ours  lack.  We  strive,  and  strive  vainly, 
to  impress  the  world  ;  they  impressed  it  without 
any  striving — their  one  aim,  indeed,  was  to  be 
ignored  by  it.  We  shrink  from  the  great,  lonely 
experiences  of  the  soul,  fearing  to  lose  our  in- 
fluence over  our  fellows ;  yet  there  never  was  a 
time  when  our  influence  as  Christians  was  weaker. 
They  rushed  into  the  spiritual  desert,  urged  by 
an  unappeasable  hunger  for  the  dread  solitudes 
of  God,  and,  like  George  Fox,  they  instinctively 
"  spoke  to  all  conditions  "  and  had  a  magic  key 
to  the  hearts  of  their  fellows.  Humble  St. 
Benedict,  starting  "  a  school  in  which  man  may 
serve  God/'  achieved  the  education  of  Europe. 
Meditative  St.  Bernard,  delighting  in  lonely 
rapture,  pent  back  for  years,  with  the  granite 
dyke  of  his  wonderful  eloquence,  the  great  in- 
tellectual revolution  which  broke  him  in  the  end. 
St.  Catherine  of  Siena,  well-nigh  intoxicated 
with  love  of  silence,  faced  Popes  and  Cardinals, 

204 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

holding  the  honour  of  the  Church  in  her  emaciated 
hands,  and  quelling  forces  that  made  the  strongest 
men  of  the  period  shrink  back.  St.  Teresa, 
glowing  visionary,  effected  a  practical  reforma- 
tion which  men  of  action  had  deemed  impossible. 
These  and  many  more  of  their  type  were  men 
and  women  who  cultivated  a  relation  to  God 
awful  in  its  singleness.  They  saw  Jesus  with 
their  own  eyes,  heard  the  word  meant  for  their 
ears  only,  and  dared  to  follow  out  the  audacious 
logic,  the  tremendous  dialectic,  of  such  individual 
experience.  They  had  seen  Jesus  at  first  hand, 
and  once  a  soul  has  seen  Jesus,  life  becomes  a 
divinely  simple  and  effective  thing — an  arrow 
flying  straight  to  its  mark. 

We  might  illustrate  the  same  great  principle 
from  the  history  of  the  Anabaptists  and  the 
great  spiritual  reformers  of  that  period.  The 
Anabaptist  communities,  whatever  their  defects 
and  extravagances,  represented  the  fellowship 
of  those  who  had  come  to  know  God  at  first 
hand,  and  to  feel  His  regenerating  touch.  It 
is  easy  for  advocates  of  the  so-called  Catholic 
Revival  to  be  witty  at  the  expense  of  those  who 
made  a  deep,  personal  experience  the  foundation- 
stone  of  the  Christian  life  and  to  speak  of  "  prig 
factories. "  These  early  re-discoverers  of  the 
personal,  experimental  way  to  God  were  obviously 
one-sided  in  their  presentation  of  Christianity, 
and  exhibited  the  unlovely  consequences  of  their 
one-sidedness ;     but    the    side    they    emphasised 

205 


Christianity  in   the  New  Age 

was  the  vital  side.  It  is  ours  to-day  to  add  the 
social  and  corporate  aspect  to  their  unfinished 
vision  ;  to  substitute  it  for  that  vision  is  sheer 
disaster.  They  dug  out  for  us  once  more  the 
only  true  foundation  upon  which  a  more  Catholic 
conception  can  be  built  ;  in  spurning  that  founda- 
tion we  are  dooming  the  superstructure. 


II 

Moreover,   in   disposing     of     that   foundation 
in  the  cheap  and  flippant  fashion  current  in  not 
a  few  quarters,  we  are  taking  it  for  granted  that 
we  are  only  dealing  with  a  handful  of  misguided 
sectarians.     In   reality   we   are   dealing   with   an 
instinct    whose    roots    are    deep    in    the    original 
documents  of  the  Faith,  and  with  a  type  of  life 
that   reflects   the   essential   atmosphere   of   New 
Testament   Christianity.     It   is   not   so   much   a 
question    of    doctrine    and    interpretation    as    of 
atmosphere,  accent,  emphasis.     Behind  these  great 
spiritual  individualists  lies  the  Gospel  landscape, 
as  it  were,  and  it  is  with  that  background  that 
we  must  come  to  terms — everything  else  is  mere 
surface  criticism.     As  we  read  the  story  of  Jesus 
in   the   Gospels   "  with  open   face,"   we  are   im- 
pressed  with   His   sharply   individual   treatment 
of  those  who  came  into  touch  with  Him.     The 
matchless  tale  of  His  miracles  is  surcharged  with 
this  quality.     The  hand  of  healing  whose  touch 
pierced  through  the  leper's  skin  to  his  sore  heart  ; 

206 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

the  endearing  name  of  Daughter  to  the  woman 
whose  innocent  shame  bade  her  hide  in  the  crowd 
and  touch  His  garments  unaware  ;  the  preliminary 
questioning  in  some  cases,  the  instantaneous 
response  to  the  faith  of  others — these  are  only  a 
few  reminders  of  the  wealth  of  individual  appeal 
which  awaits  the  discovery  of  the  patient  student 
of  the  Gospels.  The  conception  of  individuals 
as  units  in  a  force,  cogs  in  a  wheel,  means  to 
another's  end,  is  entirely  alien  to  Jesus.  So  far 
from  seeing  men  in  groups  and  crowds,  He  did 
what  we  also  do  instinctively,  once  we  forget  our 
theory  of  corporateness — He  sought  to  detach 
each  man  He  met  from  the  crowd,  to  see  him 
as  he  was  in  the  deep  places  of  his  soul,  to  under- 
stand not  merely  the  needs  and  desires  he  shared 
with  his  group,  but  those  that  were  intimately 
sacred  to  him  alone.  Men  and  women  approached 
Him  as  units  in  a  crowd,  but  the  moment  their 
eyes  met  His,  they  stood  forth  in  all  the  sharpness 
of  their  inalienable  individuality.  Unmistakable, 
unforgettable,  they  stand  revealed  to  us  as  no 
amount  of  mere  description  could  reveal  them. 
We  know  them  through  the  medium  of  our  Lord's 
sympathy  and  understanding  as  we  know  our 
nearest  and  dearest. 

And  if  we  would  regain  the  lost  gift  of  appeal- 
ing to  men,  if  we  would  attain  to  that  living 
unity  of  fellowship  which  our  barren  reaction 
from  a  fictitious  individualism  is  powerless  to 
give,  we  must  once  more  steep  ourselves  in  the 

207 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

Gospels  till  we  are  re-acclimatised  to  their 
atmosphere.  It  is  quite  true  that  that  atmo- 
sphere is  something  far  other  than  the  thin, 
trying  air  of  Puritan  or  Anabaptist  individualism  ; 
yet  no  one  can  read  the  Gospels  long  or  ponder 
them  deeply  without  feeling  that  if  Jesus  was 
right,  then  the  one  thing  that  matters,  as  nothing 
else  however  important  can  matter,  is  that  each 
soul  for  itself  should  come  into  living  touch  with 
God  and  hear  His  secret,  individual  word. 

So  long  as  we  think  of  the  love  of  God  as  a 
vague  general  philanthropy,  or  conceive  of  it 
as  a  vapid,  mystical  infusion  of  the  Divine  into 
the  human,  we  shall  be  inclined  to  deprecate 
any  very  strong  insistence  upon  the  soul's  in- 
dividual relation  to  God,  seeking  rather  to  find 
its  loyalty  to  God  in  its  loyalty  to  the  community. 
But  the  moment  we  begin  to  think  of  that  love 
simply  and  concretely  as  it  actually  came  to 
men  in  Jesus,  the  emphasis  shifts.  For  in  Jesus 
loye  began  as  a  simple  loyalty  of  affection  to 
twelve  plain  men  whom  He  had  chosen  to  be 
His  companions.  He  did  not  come  to  men 
with  what  we  would  call  nowadays  a  programme 
of  world-evangelisation.  He  had  no  plan  of 
campaign,  evolved  no  schemes,  did  not  calculate 
even  in  the  interests  of  the  Kingdom  :  He  simply 
loved.  And  He  loved  not  a  vague,  dim  mass 
of  humanity,  but  men,  women  and  children 
among  whom  His  lot  was  cast,  and,  in  a  most 
intimate   and   individual   sense,   the   twelve   dis- 

208 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

ciples.  He  chose  these  twelve  with  a  disinter- 
estedness which  would  strike  us  as  the  most 
wonderful  thing  in  the  world,  were  we  not  blunted 
to  its  significance  by  mindless  familiarity  with 
the  narrative.  He  did  not  sit  down  and  deliber- 
ately endeavour  to  select  men  who  would  be  the 
most  likely  to  further  the  interests  of  that  Kingdom 
of  God  which  He  was  sent  to  bring.  We  are 
accustomed  to  say  that  these  twelve  simple 
working-men  founded  the  Church  of  Christ ;  but 
that  is  not  completely  true.  It  was  none  of  the 
twelve  that  created  the  Church  as  a  world- 
conquering  force ;  it  was  Paul,  the  brilliant 
pupil  of  Gamaliel,  adding  Greek  culture  to 
Rabbinic  theology ;  and  behind  Paul  stood  such 
men  as  Luke,  the  beloved  physician  and  expert 
historian  ;  Apollos,  mighty  in  the  Scriptures ; 
and,  greater  than  all,  the  author  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel,  with  his  profoundly  philosophical  and 
speculative  endowment.  There  were  men  of 
the  Pauline  and  Lucan  type  in  the  world  in 
which  Jesus  lived;  but  He  did  not  go  out  to 
seek  them.  Apparently,  He  did  not  do  much 
seeking  at  all.  He  went  wandering  by  the  lake- 
side and  saw  Peter  and  Andrew,  James  and  John, 
and  asked  them  to  bear  Him  company. 

This  seems  homely  and  commonplace  enough, 
but  it  enshrines  a  whole  Divine  philosophy.  To 
treat  men  as  ends  in  themselves,  never  as  means 
to  what  might  be  considered  a  higher  end — that 
is  God's  way  with  us,  His  fundamental  principle 

o  209 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

of  love.  Many  of  us  like  to  enlarge  upon  the 
harshness  and  corruption  of  the  Church  of  Rome ; 
but  are  we  quite  sure  that  we  know  the  basal 
factor  in  her  policy  ?  Is  it  not  simply  that  Rome 
has  exalted  the  utilisation  of  men  as  means  to 
an  external  end  to  a  fine  art  ?  She  is  possessed 
of  the  evil  spirit  which  looks  upon  men  as  so 
many  pawns  to  be  moved  hither  and  thither  in 
the  ecclesiastical  game.  That  spirit  is  not  con- 
fined to  Rome.  It  was  naturalised  in  Geneva; 
it  is  witnessed  to  by  the  history  of  every  Church 
and  sect ;  and  it  is  the  fundamental  malady  of  our 
religious  outlook  to-day  and  the  bane  of  our 
Church  life.  One  need  not  go  very  far  in  any 
religious  community  to  come  upon  that  unlovely 
touting  for  members  who  are  likely  to  be  an 
asset  to  the  cause — men  with  money  or  talents, 
personality  or  charm.  It  seems  so  natural  and 
harmless  to  canvass  and  exploit  our  fellows  in 
the  interests  of  the  Kingdom  ;  indeed,  it  seems 
a  distinctly  religious  procedure.  But  it  is  essen- 
tially unchristian  ;  it  is  characteristically  ultra- 
montane, though  it  appear  in  a  hyper-Calvinist 
conventicle.  It  is  the  besetting  temptation  of 
those  who  are  ambitious  for  Christ's  cause;'  it 
is  threatening  to  strangle  the  life  out  of  the 
Church  to-day,  and  accounts  for  much  of  our 
spiritual  failure.  To  use  men  as  means  is  to 
be  disloyal  to  Him  who  chose  the  dull  and  slow 
of  heart,  the  ungifted  and  awkward,  for  their 
own  sakes,   and  was  loyal  to   them  when  they 

210 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

most  retarded  His  cause  and  marred  His  work. 
He  loved  His  own,  and  He  loved  them  to  the 
end.  Love  does  not  calculate,  it  does  not  scheme  ; 
it  simply  loves  and  serves. 


Ill 

The  time  has  come  for  us  to  face  the  implica- 
tions of  such  a  doctrine.  If  it  means  anything 
at  all,  it  means  that  every  man  is  intended  to 
make  personal  experience  of  the  love  of  God,  to 
enter  into  a  communion  with  his  Maker  in  which 
no  other  can  intermeddle,  that  his  chief  end — to 
use  the  memorable  old  words — is  "  to  glorify 
God  and  enjoy  Him  for  ever."  It  means  that 
it  is  our  first  business  to  seek  this  experience  for 
ourselves,  and  our  second  business  to  witness 
to  others  concerning  it.  This  does  not  imply 
a  self-centred  and  isolated  religion.  The  in- 
dividual, as  we  well  know,  is  not  a  self-contained 
unit.  He  is  set  in  a  community,  and  it  is  in  and 
through  that  community  that  he  will  fully  realise 
his  personal  destiny  ;  but  he  can  only  be  of  real 
help  to  the  community  so  long  as  he  does  not 
put  it  into  the  place  of  that  personal  relation  to 
a  Divine  Person  which  is  his  true  life.  His  work 
for  the  community,  so  far  from  being  the  end  to 
which  he  is  to  be  subordinated,  is  a  means  for 
his  perfecting,  and  through  his  perfecting  for 
the  perfecting  of  his  fellow-members.  This  is 
unwelcome    doctrine    in    an    age    in    which    the 

211 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

commonwealth  of  men  has  taken  the  place  of  the 
Kingdom  of  God,  and  a  sentimental  confusion 
has  identified  a  man's  personal  with  his  selfish 
interests  ;  but  it  is  the  only  doctrine  that  will 
avail  to  make  the  Church  once  more  holy  and 
Catholic,  at  once  an  ark  of  refuge  and  a  fighting 
force.  Protest  as  we  will,  the  supreme  need  in 
the  Church  to-day  is  not  for  men  willing  to 
"  do  their  bit,"  but  for  men  whose  contribution 
to  the  Christian  fellowship  will  be  their  selves  — 
their  redeemed  and  consecrated  personalities.  To 
oppose  such  an  ideal  to  corporate  welfare  is  only 
possible  when,  as  we  have  said  already,  the 
community  is  conceived  of  in  biological  and 
spatial  terms.  Once  the  essentially  spiritual 
nature  of  the  corporate  life  is  recognised,  it 
becomes  clear  that  the  man  who  sees  God  face 
to  face  on  the  lonely  mount  of  vision  is  thereby 
nearer  to  his  fellows  and  more  closely  identified 
with  the  common  life  of  the  community  than  the 
most  heroic  toiler  in  the  plains  without  such 
moments  of  vision.  It  is  when,  shutting  the 
door,  he  prays  to  his  Father  who  seeth  in  secret 
that  his  finger  is  on  the  pulse  of  humanity  and  he 
knows  himself  one  with  his  brethren. 

The  New  Testament  Church  is  the  classic 
illustration  of  this  principle.  There  never  was 
a  Christian  community  which  exemplified  the 
common  life  and  the  corporate  consciousness  so 
triumphantly.  Its  members  called  nothing  their 
own,   and  ate  bread  in  common  with  gladness. 

313 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

They  felt  the  sap  of  the  one  Vine  pulsing  through 
each  and  all  of  its  branches  ;  they  saw  each  other 
in  Christ,  and,  living  unto  Him,  lived  for  each 
other  and  for  the  community  with  an  instinc- 
tive and  complete  loyalty.  And  when  the  first 
flush  of  new  life  had  ebbed  and  dissensions 
marred  the  unity  of  the  redeemed,  Paul  and  the 
Pauline  circle  perpetuated  the  Apostolic  spirit. 
"  Who  is  weak,  and  I  am  not  weak  ?  who  is 
offended,  and  I  burn  not  ?  "  *  Yet  this  same  Paul, 
whose  sense  of  spiritual  solidarity  was  so  vivid 
as  to  be  a  constant  pain  to  him,  was  the 
preacher  of  a  Gospel  of  individual  redemption. 
Penitence,  faith,  reconciliation,  the  inward  wit- 
ness, mystic  union — all  these  realities,  however 
interpreted,  can  only  be  experienced  by  the 
individual,  and  not  by  the  group  as  such.  The 
Church  of  Paul  was  an  organic  unity.  When  it 
met  for  worship,  each  member  had  something 
to  contribute  to  the  common  stock.  "  When 
ye  come  together,  every  one  of  you  hath  a  psalm, 
hath  a  doctrine,  hath  a  tongue,  hath  a  revelation, 
hath  an  interpretation/ '  f  But  behind  this  pool- 
ing of  spiritual  riches  lay  the  dread  solitude  of 
those  who  are  apprehended  of  Christ  in  the  deep, 
lonely  places  of  the  soul.  Our  meetings  for 
prayer  and  worship  lack  the  unifying  note.  We 
come  encased  each  in  his  particular  religious 
mood  and  theological  bent.  If  one  member  tries 
to  make  his  contribution  to  the  common  stock, 

*  2  Cor.  xi.  29.  I  1  Cor.  xiv.  26. 

213 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

others  are  sure  to  find  it  uncongenial  and  even 
jarring.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  in  spite  of  our 
reiterated  emphasis  upon  corporateness,  we  re- 
tain the  most  unlovely  aspects  of  individualism. 
We  have  allowed  cheap  criticism  to  filch  our 
treasure  from  us.  We  have  fallen  a  prey  to  a 
superficial  theory  of  the  community,  which  calls 
itself  Catholic,  but  is  in  reality  pagan  and,  in 
fundamental  essence,  materialistic.  Common  sense 
ought  to  have  taught  us  long  ere  this  that  to 
decry  the  individual  is  to  belittle  the  community, 
and  that  to  minimise  the  importance  of  personal 
sanctity  is  to  kill  the  Christian  society  at  its  very 
root.  There  is  an  altar  in  men — a  deep  and 
majestic  place — where  the  soul  transacts  with 
its  God,  and  life  is  cleansed  and  kindled  with  un- 
earthly flame.  To-day  we  tend  to  live  in  the 
laboratory  and  the  kitchen ;  our  concern  is 
to  "  keep  the  home  fires  burning."  But  it  is  the 
altar  that  makes  the  man ;  and  if  the  altar  fire 
is  allowed  to  go  out,  what  was  once  a  meeting- 
place  of  earth  and  heaven,  pulsing  with  angelic 
life,  becomes  a  pathetic  survival. 

There  is  much  work  to  do  for  and  in  the 
Church,  and  to  eyes  newly  opened  to  the  world's 
need  the  one  important  thing  seems  to  be  to 
enrol  workers  and  still  more  workers.  But  if 
the  altar  makes  the  temple,  then  its  services 
must  be  brought  to  the  testing  of  the  altar  fire. 
Morbid  spiritual  self-culture  is  obviously  fatal, 
and  working  for  others  is  in  many  cases  a  more 

214 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

potent  means  of  grace  than  a  thousand  sacra- 
ments. But  having  granted  that,  we  must  still 
suspect  the  external  activity — -however  useful 
and  beneficent — which  renders  the  soul  distracted 
and  unconcentrated,  unfitting  it  for  its  supreme 
business.  We  are  not  concerned  here  with  the 
humble  and  irksome  duties  of  life,  which  may  be 
as  straight  a  road  to  God  as  prayer,  but  with  self- 
imposed  tasks  often  born  of  the  fatal  lust  to 
be  busy  at  all  costs.  St.  Ambrose  retails  the 
quaint  old  belief  that  when  eaglets  have  arrived 
at  a  certain  age,  the  parent  bird  takes  them  to  the 
edge  of  the  rock  and  holds  their  heads  up  to  the 
sun.  If  they  can  endure  its  blaze  without  blink- 
ing, it  knows  them  for  true  scions  of  the  eagle 
race  ;  if  they  wince  and  close  their  eyes,  it  drops 
them  over  the  edge  of  the  abyss.  Which  things 
are  a  parable.  The  adventurous  soul  is  the  soul 
that  has  the  courage  to  relinquish  every  task, 
however  good  in  itself,  which  unfits  it  for  that 
sustained  gaze  into  the  face  of  God  that  is  its 
very  life. 

This  takes  courage.  There  is  something  attrac- 
tive to  the  noble  soul  about  a  religion  that  is 
chivalrous  and  full  of  humanitarian  passion, 
expressing  itself  in  social  crusades  and  social 
service.  Compared  to  it,  a  religion  which  puts 
the  individual's  inward  relation  to  God  and  com- 
munion with  Him  in  the  forefront  seems  at  first 
sight  valetudinarian  and  selfish.  Yet  a  deeper 
view   shows   it   to   involve   the   utmost   courage 

215 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  self-abnegation.  The  moment  we  strip  such 
terms  as  penitence,  conversion,  prayer,  mystic 
union  of  their  conventional  trappings,  we  are  in 
an  august  and  lonely  region  where  only  the  brave 
can  venture.  With  all  our  vaunted  joy  in  risk 
and  our  gospel  of  the  adventurous  life,  we  are 
afraid  of  the  inner  world  as  our  fathers  were 
not.  And  even  if  we  were  as  courageous  as  they, 
it  still  remains  that  to  draw  near  to  God  in  spirit 
and  in  truth  is  a  thing  to  make  the  bravest  falter. 
It  belongs,  not  to  the  inherent  tenderness  of  the 
Gospel,  but  to  our  vulgarisation  of  that  tenderness, 
that  we  can  speak  of  man's  communion  with  God 
as  a  religious  and  psychological  commonplace, 
and  run  lightly  up  that  Hill  of  God  which  the 
saints  trod  in  holy  fear.  Dora  Greenwell,  in 
speaking  of  "  the  parsimony  of  grace/'  treats  of 
the  mystery  and  augustness  of  that  communion 
from  an  angle  we  neglect  to  our  loss  : — 

How  few  from  age  to  age  are  called  into  close 
neighbourhood  and  nearness  with  God  ;  how  few  even 
among  these  chosen  to  remain  with  Him  in  unbroken 
spiritual  communion  !  .  .  .  Only  from  time  to  time 
does  a  heart  touched  by  His  highest  influence  awake  to 
wonder,  to  adore,  to  see  Him  as  He  is.  Yet  the  river 
of  God  is  full  of  water,  with  Him  is  the  residue  of  the 
Spirit.  Spiritual  creation  must  be  as  easy  to  God  as 
is  natural,  yet  man  seems  kept  at  a  great  distance  from 
God  purposely,  and  no  doubt  in  mercy.  .  .  .  "  What 
has  close  friendship  with  God  ever  proved  to  man  but 
a  costly,  self-sacrificing  service  ?  "     The  eminent  favour 

216 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

of  God,  as  shown  in  large  spiritual  graces,  seems  to 
expose  the  recipient  to  such  grievous  outward  persecu- 
tions, to  such  insidious  attacks,  such  protracted  secret 
trials,  that  I  have  long  learnt  to  acquiesce  in  the  hiding 
of  God's  power,  and  to  look  upon  it,  as  I  have  said,  as 
one  of  the  deep  secrets  of  His  mercy.* 

How  little  we  know  of  this  shrinking  from 
intimate  commerce  with  God  !  Yet  no  man  ever 
truly  saw  God  who  did  not  shrink  from  that 
which  such  a  vision  involves.  We  take  the 
caricature  of  personal  religion,  the  man  who 
delights  in  pious  exercises  but  often  lives  as  if 
he  were  ignorant  of  the  very  elements  of  justice 
and  mercy,  and  then  speak  of  the  selfishness  of 
looking  after  one's  own  soul  and  leaving  the  world 
to  perish.  Such  cheap  taunts  may  do  very  well 
for  the  street-corner  orator ;  that  they  should 
have  crept  into  our  books  on  religious  reconstruc- 
tion is  deplorable,  and  one  finds  it  hard  to  believe 
that  men  who  have  themselves  approached  the 
inner  sanctuary  can  descend  to  them.  The  cry 
of  the  hour  is  that  the  Church  must  vindicate 
her  right  to  exist  by  making  a  genuine  contribu- 
tion to  the  world's  life.  True  ;  but  her  supreme 
contribution  to  the  world's  life  is  the  man  whose 
feet  stand  within  the  gates  of  the  spiritual  temple, 
whose  life  is  hid  with  Christ  in  God.  Such  men 
are  like  the  ten  righteous  that  might  have  saved 
Sodom — their  influence  is  incalculable.  Nor  are 
they  only  to  be  found  among  the  scanty  ranks 

*  "  Colloquia  Crucis,"  pp.   122-123. 
217 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

of  born  mystics,  as  we  tend  to  imagine.  History 
shows  how  men  of  average  gifts  and  practical 
turn,  men  of  dull  imagination  and  unremarkable 
personality,  have  heard  the  call  of  God,  and 
leaving  the  comfortable  ruts  of  conventional 
living  have  risen  to  dynamic  sanctity.  There 
is  no  company  so  representative  of  every  imagin- 
able type  of  humanity  as  the  glorious  company 
of  saints.  There  is  no  congregation  so  common- 
place that  the  fire  of  God  cannot  kindle  it  to 
splendour,  no  soul  so  dark  that  the  call  of  God 
cannot  make  it  illustrious.  The  world  demands 
many  things  from  a  feeble,  halting  Church,  and 
not  a  few  of  its  demands  are  entirely  valid  ;  but 
its  deepest,  though  often  inarticulate,  cry  is  for 
men  who  have  seen  God  upon  the  mount  and 
bring  the  light  of  the  Sanctuary  down  to  earth. 
In  our  hurry  to  respond  to  the  social  challenge, 
we  have  all  but  forgotten  the  supreme  debt  we 
owe  to  our  fellow-men,  the  fundamental  charity 
out  of  which  all  charities  spring.  We  are  not 
brave  enough  to  leave  the  market-place  and 
enter  the  secret  chamber  that  we  may  sanctify 
ourselves  for  the  world's  sake.  We  need  the 
poet's  astringent  message  transmuted  into  the 
highest  spiritual  terms  : — 

For  this  is  Love's  nobility — 
Not  to  scatter  bread  and  gold, 
Goods  and  raiment  bought  and  sold  ; 
But  to  hold  fast  his  simple  sense, 
And  speak  the  speech  of  innocence,  , 

218 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

And  with  hand,  and  body,  and  blood, 
To  make  his  bosom-counsel  good. 
He  that  feeds  men  serveth  few  ; 
He  serveth  all  that  dares  be  true. 


IV 

"  After  a  few  months'  experience  of  conditions 
out  here/'  wrote  an  officer  at  the  Front,  "  I 
think  a  good  many  people  have  come  to  the  con- 
clusion that  there  is  only  one  thing  worth  living 
for,  only  one  thing  worth  thinking  about — and 
that  is  God."  *  If  this  testimony  is  repre- 
sentative of  a  widespread  movement  —  and 
there  is  every  ground  for  believing  that  it  is — 
why  do  not  men  who  are  thus  exercised  about 
the  great  issues  of  life  betake  themselves  in 
larger  numbers  to  the  Church  and  its  teachers  ? 
Mr.  C.  H.  S.  Matthews  finds  the  reason  for  this 
reluctance  in  the  lack  of  frankness  and  inward- 
ness which  characterises  the  bulk  of  our 
preaching  : — 

Men  want  something  more  than  a  tradition  that 
has  become  for  them  the  empty  form  in  which  men  of 
other  ages  have  tried  to  explain  their  apprehension, 
under  other  conditions  of  life  and  knowledge,  of  the 
living  God.  They  would  rather  have  an  honest  attempt, 
however  inadequate,  to  express  a  genuine  experience 
of  our  own  day  than  the  most  eloquent  exposition  of 
the  established  orthodoxy  by  a  man  who  shows  no  signs 

♦Quoted  in  "Faith  and  Freedom,"  p.  5. 
219 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

of  having  himself  wrestled  with  God  for  the  truth  he 
has  to  proclaim.  That  is  the  real  reason  why  a  book 
like  Mr.  Wells's  "  God  the  Invisible  King  "  has  a  sale, 
and  arouses  an  interest  among  the  laity  which  no  book 
by  any  officer  of  the  Church  could  hope  to  rival.  It  is 
a  book  peculiarly  easy  to  criticise.  Its  philosophy  and 
its  theology  are  astonishingly  inadequate,  but  it  is 
obviously  the  sincere  utterance  of  a  man  who  speaks 
out  of  a  real  and  vivid  experience  of  the  living  God,  and 
therefore  it  commands  attention  in  a  world  where  men, 
however  blindly,  are  seeking  the  living  God.* 

One  is  not  quite  sure  if  it  is  correct  to  say 
that  it  is  the  vital  experience  behind  Mr.  Wells's 
book  which  made  it  so  amazingly  popular.  It 
is  at  least  open  to  question  whether  the  book 
would  have  been  quite  so  eagerly  bought,  had 
its  author  not  been  a  popular  novelist  whose 
religious  convictions  had  undergone  a  complete 
metamorphosis.  Yet  the  main  issue  remains 
the  same  :  it  is  the  preacher  or  writer  who  can 
speak  out  of  a  vital  experience  of  God  that 
finds  a  response.  And  it  is  this  vital  element 
that  is  largely  lacking  in  present-day  preaching. 
The  average  sermon  does  not  spring  straight 
from  life,or  make  a  direct  appeal  to  that  mysterious, 
deep  life  that  slumbers  in  man.  Comparatively 
few  preachers,  indeed,  speak  out  of  a  spiritual 
experience  so  dynamic  that  it  creates  its  own 
message,  as  it  were,  and  speak  in  the  sure  convic- 
tion that  deep  in  the  hearer's  soul  lies  the  hidden 

*  "  Faith  and  Freedom,"  pp.   6,   7. 
220 


Call  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

seed,  the  inward  witness,  that  can  respond  to 
the  message.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  thoughtful 
and  impressive  preaching,  a  good  deal  of  able 
reconstruction  of  the  historical  background  of 
texts,  of  practical  application,  persuasive  appeal 
and  suggestive  reflection  ;  but  one  seldom  feels 
that  the  preacher  is  speaking  of  that  which  he 
has  seen  and  known  and  his  hands  have  handled, 
and  that  his  words  are  words  of  life,  words  kindling 
life,  words  that  have  hands  to  grip  and  feet  to 
pursue.  The  preacher's  sense  of  the  fact  that 
the  stolid,  conventional  assembly  sitting  before 
him  was  created  for  the  express  purpose  of  drink- 
ing deep  of  the  very  life  of  God,  that  in  each 
soul  there  is  something  waiting  to  be  born,  some- 
thing so  potent  that  it  needs  but  a  touch  to  set 
it  free,  seems  to  be  weak  and  fitful.  And  what 
is  true  of  preaching  is  equally  true  of  the  minister's 
private  intercourse  on  things  spiritual.  He  may 
be  a  good  fireside  apologist,  a  stimulating  coun- 
sellor, and  sympathetic  comforter ;  but  one 
misses  the  direct  impact  of  life  upon  life.  And  it 
is  largely  for  want  of  this  vital  quality  that 
ministers  have  become  dissatisfied  and  disillu- 
sioned, and  tend  to  blame  the  defects  of  their 
ecclesiastical  system,  or  the  conditions  under 
which  they  have  to  work,  for  that  which  nothing 
so  external  can  remedy. 

Thus  a  chaplain  with  the  Mesopotamian  Force, 
writing  on  "The  'Failure'  of  the  Church,' ' 
finds  one  cause  in  the  fact  that  the  average  man 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

trained  in  a  Protestant  atmosphere  is  ignorant  of 
the  true  priestly  function  of  the  clergy : — 

I  often  wonder  how  many  priests  of  the  Church 
of  England  have  found  any  great  demand  for  their 
sacerdotal  services  to  wounded  and  dying  in  the  heat 
of  a  battle.  For  my  part,  I  regret  to  say  that  (except 
in  a  few  cases)  I  have  been  able  to  do  little  more  than 
the  work  of  a  stretcher-bearer  ;  simply  because  men 
did  not  understand  one's  priestly  function  and  powers. 
In  all  cases  they  appreciate  the  "  padre  "  asa  preacher- 
man,  a  sport,  and  a  friend.  Otherwise  his  position 
conveys  nothing  to  them.  And  this  is  because  they 
do  not  know.  And  here  they  miss  the  comfort  and 
discipline  of  religion.* 

This  is  a  typical  utterance,  and  it  is  pro- 
foundly symptomatic.  We  are  not  concerned 
here  with  the  question  of  the  validity  or  other- 
wise of  sacerdotal  claims.  The  point  is  that  if 
a  priest  cannot  represent  the  deeper  aspects 
of  man's  life  in  Christ  as  a  mere  "  padre  " — "  a 
preacher-man,  a  sport  and  a  friend  "—he  will  do 
well  to  consider  whether  he  has  not  missed  his 
calling  as  a  priest.  Whatever  be  the  importance 
of  Sacraments,  if  the  ordinary  layman  who  really 
knows  his  Lord  cannot,  during  an  informal  talk 
with  a  wounded  or  dying  man,  speak  the  word 
of  witness  which,  halting  and  defective  though 
it  be,  will  vindicate  itself  as  coming  from  the 
deep  and  calling  to  the  deep,  Christianity  is 
hardly    worth    troubling    about.     That    a    man 

*  The  Church  Times,  August  30,   19 18. 
222 


Gall  for  Adventurous  Discipleship 

should  exercise  the  office  of  a  priest  without 
having  first  made  proof  of  the  Divine  efficacy 
of  the  word  spoken  by  the  wayside,  and  realising 
that  he  who  witnesses  to  what  he  has  himself 
experienced  has  in  very  deed  the  Word  of  God 
in  his  mouth,  is  amazing.  One  cannot  conceive 
what  intelligent  sacramental  teaching  such  a 
priest  could  give. 

The  truth  of  the  matter  is  that  until  we  have 
recovered  that  deep,  experimental  knowledge  of 
God,  lacking  which  neither  preacher  nor  priest 
has  any  right  to  his  office,  it  is  futile  to  argue 
about  Sacraments,  or,  indeed,  about  anything 
else.  Once  the  preacher  speaks  out  of  his  intimate 
experience,  and  speaks  not  to  the  crowd  but  to 
the  soul,  with  an  individual,  dynamic,  spiritual 
accent,  there  will  be  no  occasion  to  talk  of  the 
failure  of  the  Church.  For  the  failure  of  the 
Church  is  bound  up  with  the  failure  of  individual 
discipleship,  and  where  there  is  no  life,  the  Sacra- 
ments are  a  delusion. 


223 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  CALL  FOR  AN  ADVENTUROUS  CHURCH 

I 

In  emphasising  the  call  for  an  adventurous 
Church,  we  are  at  one  with  many  outside  her 
borders  who  have  declared  that  they  would 
gladly  cast  in  their  lot  with  a  Church  ready  to 
do  and  dare  to  the  uttermost,  but  cannot  see 
why  men  of  virile  fibre  and  high  ideals  should 
be  expected  to  attach  themselves  to  an  institu- 
tion whose  sole  concern  seems  to  be  to  keep 
itself  alive — a  task  which  indeed  absorbs  what 
energy  it  still  possesses.  "  We  have  learnt/' 
they  say,  "  that  there  are  things  more  precious 
than  life,  that  to  live  for  oneself  and  one's  own 
safety  and  well-being  isn't  a  man's  life  at  all. 
And  we  naturally  expect  the  Church  to  lead 
the  way  in  unselfishness  and  courage.  We  expect 
her  to  live  not  for  her  own  comfort  but  for  the 
world  around  her,  to  lead  in  every  righteous 
crusade,  to  inspire  social  reform,  and  to  be  the 
spokesman  of  the  neglected  and  oppressed.  But 
wherever  we  look  the  Church's  main  concern 
seems  to  be  with  her  rolls  of  membership  and 
her    balance-sheets.     So    long    as    the    financial 

224 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

year  closes  with  a  credit  balance  and  the  member- 
ship is  fairly  well  maintained,  the  average  con- 
gregation congratulates  itself  upon  its  prosperity. 
The  fact  that  it  is  surrounded  by  a  population 
living  in  social  and  spiritual  darkness,  and  that 
it  has  done  little,  if  anything,  to  uplift,  comfort 
and  enlighten  those  outside  its  doors,  and  to 
help  them  to  regard  the  Church  as  their  natural 
refuge  and  home,  does  not  seem  to  trouble  it. 
Its  horizon  is  bounded  by  such  questions  as 
pew  -  rents,  collections,  ecclesiastical  schemes, 
church  socials,  and  the  thousand  and  one  other 
matters  which  pertain  to  the  conventional  life 
of  a  modern  congregation/ ' 

Such  criticism  is,  of  course,  less  than  just  in 
as  far  as  it  takes  the  form  of  a  sweeping  general- 
isation ;  yet  no  one  can  pretend  that  it  does  not 
embody  a  truth  which  might  well  fill  the  Church 
with  searchings  of  heart.  It  cannot  be  denied 
that  her  besetting  sins  are  timidity  and  selfish- 
ness. Her  fear  of  opposing  vested  interests  and 
powerful  institutions,  of  alienating  those  who 
have  in  the  past  been  among  her  most  liberal 
financial  supporters,  and  of  offending  pious  folk 
whose  conception  of  their  Christian  duty  does 
not  seem  to  include  human  sympathy  and  social 
justice,  is  a  dark  blot  on  her  escutcheon.  Her 
confirmed  tendency  to  degenerate  into  a  religious 
club  for  a  coterie  of  mediocre,  respectable  folk 
whose  one  ambition  is  to  be  comfortable  in  the 
spiritual  life  as  in  everything  else,  to  mix  only 

p  225 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

with  people  of  their  own  social  standing,  and 
to  see  their  organisations  financially  prosperous, 
repels  high-minded  men  who  would  otherwise 
seek  light  and  leading  at  her  hands.  Whatever 
the  Church  is,  she  is  not  adventurous;  and  the 
best  instinct  in  man  demands  that  those  who 
name  the  name  of  Christ  take  the  high  places 
of  the  field  and  launch  forth  boldly  into  the  deep. 
Nor  has  the  searching  fire  of  war  done  more  up 
to  the  present  than  reveal  the  Church's  weak- 
ness. It  has  not  kindled  a  fire  in  her  midst. 
It  has  not  inspired  her  to  break  through  the  con- 
ventional conception  which  makes  her  first  task 
to  consist  in  getting  people  to  "  come  to  church/' 
In  one  of  the  National  Mission  leaflets,  the  writer, 
after  referring  in  moving  terms  to  the  heroism 
and  self-sacrifice  of  our  soldiers,  reaches  this 
conclusion :  "  Let  us  therefore  lay  aside  all 
scruples  begotten  of  timidity,  and  with  great 
boldness  make  a  personal  resolution  to  live  as 
Catholic  Christians  in  the  best  sense  of  that  word, 
and  from  this  day  forward  let  us  say  our  night 
and  morning  prayers,  and  say  grace  before  and 
after  our  meals  wherever  eaten."  *  That  such  a 
leaflet  should  have  been  published  and  circulated 
is  surely  a  lamentable  sign,  and  no  one  can  wonder 
that  men  and  women  who  have  faced  reality, 
to  however  limited  an  extent,  turn  away  with 
contempt  from  a  type  of  Churchmanship  which, 

*  Quoted   by  Miss   A.  Maude  Royden,    "  The  Hour  and  the 
Church,"  p.  73. 

226 


The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

in  face  of  the  heroism  of  the  trenches,  exhorts 
good  Christians  to  have  the  great  boldness  "  to 
say  grace  before  and  after  meals  wherever  eaten  "  ! 
But  if  the  Church's  critics,  in  laying  a  merciless 
finger  upon  her  lack  of  adventurousness,   have 
done  her  a  service,   it  is  otherwise  when  they 
proceed  to  define  what  precisely  they  mean  by 
an  adventurous  Church.     For  most  of  them  the 
adventurous  Church  is  the  popular  Church,  i.e,t 
a  Church  which,  while  by  no  means  in  favour 
with    the    moneyed    classes    or    the    prosperous 
bourgeoisie,    is    understood    and    appreciated  by 
the  masses  of  the  people,  who  find  in  her  the 
redresser  of  their  injuries,  the  champion  of  their 
rights,  and  the  provider  of  the  kind  of  teaching 
and  sentiment,   work  and  play,   fellowship  and 
mutual  support,  which  they  crave  for.     They  ask 
how  it  is  that  Church  work  and  organisation  lack 
that  warm  life,  absolute  unanimity  of  aim,  cheer- 
ful good  fellowship  in  which  all  personal  differ- 
ences and  predilections  are  forgotten  in  the  joy 
of  working  together  for  a  common  cause.     They 
wonder  why  the  consciousness  of  a  common  foe 
to  fight  and  a  common  end  to  attain  does  not 
impel  the  Churches  to  unite  and  present  one  un- 
broken front. 

But  in  defining  the  adventurous  Church  as 
a  Church  of  the  masses,  and  demanding  her 
corporate  union  with  a  view  to  her  increased 
popularity  and  effectiveness,  we  are  in  reality 
denying  her   adventurousness.     For    a  depleted 

227 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  dismembered  Church  to  cut  herself  adrift 
from  a  middle-class  constituency,  whose  attach- 
ment is  palpably  weakening,  and  make  a  bold 
appeal  to  the  masses,  takes  a  certain  degree  of 
resolution  and  hardihood,  and  may  involve  some 
unpleasantness  and  controversy  ;  but  it  is  scarcely 
an  adventure :  it  is  essentially  a  counsel  of  com- 
mon sense.  The  same  might  be  said  of  corporate 
union.  Motives  of  prudence  and  the  instinct 
of  self-preservation  are  all  that  is  required  to 
effect  such  a  union,  and  the  time  is  fast  approach- 
ing when  it  will  take  far  more  courage  and  adven- 
turousness — for  the  Free  Churches,  at  any  rate — 
to  keep  separate  than  to  unite.  This  does  not 
imply,  of  course,  that  a  Church  which  attracts 
the  democracy  and  is  bent  upon  corporate  union 
is  necessarily  actuated  by  prudential  and  utilitarian 
motives.  On  the  contrary,  one  sees  the  time 
coming  when  the  Church  will  be  truly  one,  and 
truly  a  Church  of  the  people,  as  a  consequence 
of  its  fearless  obedience  to  the  Spirit's  leading. 
In  the  present  instance,  however,  we  are  dealing 
with  a  certain  popular  conception  of  what  the 
Church's  policy  should  be,  and  in  that  particular 
conception  her  popular  appeal  and  her  endeavours 
towards  corporate  union  are  frankly  based  upon 
utilitarian  considerations.  Seeing  that  it  is  not 
the  external  action  but  the  spirit  which  counts, 
such  a  conception,  whatever  truth  of  a  lower 
order  it  may  embody,  is  not  the  conception  of 
an  adventurous  Church.     The  adventurous  Church 

228 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

may  attract  the  masses  for  a  season,  even  as  her 
Master  was  heard  gladly  of  the  common  people 
for  a  season  ;  but  if  she  be  indeed  a  Church  of 
Christ,  she  will  be  no  more  permanently  popular 
than  He  was.  She  will  consent  to  be  neither 
an  almoner  nor  an  arbitrator.  Again  and  again 
she  will  have  to  refuse  the  request  of  him  who 
would  bid  her  command  his  brother  to  share  his 
inheritance  with  him,  and  will  speak  of  the 
forgiveness  of  sins  to  him  who  asks  freedom  from 
physical  disability  or  release  from  hampering 
conditions.  She  will  indeed  labour  to  secure 
for  men  the  best  possible  environment ;  but  she 
will  refuse  to  agree  with  the  social  enthusiast  that 
the  slum  and  the  village  hovel  are  the  only  exist- 
ing types  of  bad  environment,  insisting  that 
the  sleek  comfort  and  superficial  religiosity  of 
the  middle-class  church-going  family,  and  the 
humanistic  culture  and  refined  self-centredness 
of  certain  academic  circles,  provide  an  environ- 
ment fully  as  vicious,  and  far  more  difficult 
to  counteract  or  redeem,  as  the  open  scandal 
of  mean  streets  and  brutalised  agricultural  dis- 
tricts. She  will  be  bold  to  declare  that  her 
mission  is  to  the  rich  as  well  as  to  the  poor,  to 
the  respectable  as  much  as  to  the  outcast,  and 
that  the  needs  of  the  first  are  possibly  even  more 
urgent  than  the  needs  of  the  second.  She  will 
maintain,  in  the  face  of  opposition  and  contempt, 
that  if  it  is  her  high  privilege  to  feel  for  the 
struggling  ranks  of  Labour  and  bring   a   warm 

229 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

and  active  sympathy  to  its  just  aspirations,  it  is 
no  less  her  duty  to  sympathise  with  the  difficulties 
of  the  capitalist,  and  to  help  him  also  in  his 
equally  hard  struggle  to  keep  his  soul  alive. 
If  she  is  under  stern  obligation  to  denounce  the 
vices  of  the  rich  and  to  condemn  the  exploiter 
of  his  fellows,  she  is  no  less  solemnly  bound  to 
convict  King  Demos  of  his  sins. 

Such  a  Church  cannot  hope  to  be  popular. 
Like  her  Lord,  she  will  be  set  for  the  fall  and 
rising  again  of  many,  and  for  a  sign  which  shall 
be  spoken  against.  Nor  will  her  attitude  towards 
the  question  of  corporate  union  commend  her 
to  the  great  mass  of  men.  Against  all  popular 
demands,  she  will  deprecate  a  union  based  upon 
compromise,  indifference,  or  utilitarian  considera- 
tions. She  will  judge  that  he  who  holds  his  dis- 
tinctive convictions  in  Christ's  name,  that  is, 
in  the  spirit  of  Christ,  is  a  truer  friend  of  unity 
than  the  man  who  clamours  for  a  compromise  in 
order  that  the  Church  may  be  more  outwardly 
impressive  and  efficient.  She  will  declare  that 
confidence  in  the  power  of  an  outward  union  is 
nothing  else  than  confidence  in  the  flesh  ;  that 
it  is,  in  essence,  materialistic  and  not  spiritual. 
She  will  remind  men  that  our  Lord  found  a 
united  ecclesiastical  organisation  and  flung  fire 
and  a  severing  sword  into  its  midst,  and  that  in 
all  ages  it  has  not  been  the  Church's  true  prophets 
and  leaders  who  have  laboured  to  conserve  her 
outward  unbrokenness  or  gloried  in  her  imposing 

230 


The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

size.  She  will  contend  that  a  corporate  union 
of  sects,  so  far  from  being  necessary  to  that  true 
unity  of  insight,  love  and  witness  which  is  Christ's 
purpose  for  His  Church,  may,  under  certain 
circumstances,  be  the  worst  enemy  of  that  unity, 
leaving  the  world  impressed,  perhaps,  but  as 
worldly  as  before. 


II 

The  fact  is  that  outside  critics  of  the  Church, 
while  often  worth  listening  to,  cannot  speak 
the  final  word,  for  the  simple  reason  that  they 
do  not  and  cannot  know  what  the  Church  is  in 
her  essential  nature  and  Divine  calling.  They 
recognise  that  she  is  not  what  she  ought  to  be. 
They  have  their  own  vision  of  the  ide$l  Church, 
and  it  is  well  for  us  to  pay  heed  to  that  vision. 
Yet,  in  the  last  resort,  they  have  no  positive 
contribution  to  make  to  our  problem.  They 
recognise  the  Church's  disease,  and  their  diagnosis 
is  penetrative,  and,  in  the  main,  correct.  It  is 
when  they  attempt  to  prescribe  that  they  go 
astray ;  for  their  fundamental  conception  of  the 
Church  is  at  fault,  and  their  suggested  reforms 
proceed  upon  a  basis  which,  however  valid  in 
its  place,  is  not  the  rock  upon  which  Christ  built 
His  Church.  And  the  reason  why  so  many 
inside  the  Church  are  ready,  not  merely  to  accept 
their  strictures — which  we  ought  to  do  in  all 
humility — but    to    put    their    suggested    reforms 

231 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

into  execution,  is  that  the  majority  of  Church 
members  have  lost  sight  of  the  New  Testament 
doctrine  of  the  Church.  They  have  forgotten 
what  the  Church  is  in  her  essential  nature,  and 
what  she  stands  for.  This  is  scarcely  their 
fault ;  it  is  one  more  result  of  the  decay  of  the 
Church's  teaching  ministry  and  of  the  vulgarisa- 
tion of  her  life. 

The  average  man  tends  to  regard  the  ideal 
Church  as  a  religious  club — not,  indeed,  in  any 
exclusive  or  "  West-Endy  "  sense,  but  very  much 
after  the  pattern  of  the  war-time  Y.M.C.A. 
Now,  speaking  theoretically,  there  is  no  reason 
whatever  why  a  Church  conceived  as  a  club 
should  not  prove  a  very  helpful  institution ; 
why,  for  example,  it  should  not  radiate  that 
atmosphere  of  brotherly  love  and  comradely 
co-operation  which  is  so  much  needed  in  this 
cold  world  of  ours.  But  as  a  matter  of  hard 
fact,  wherever  any  particular  congregation 
models  itself  upon  the  club  principle,  it  at 
best  proves  but  a  very  second-rate  edition  of 
the  secular  club  or  association.  There  are  not 
the  same  energy  and  good  management,  the 
same  friendliness  and  loyalty,  that  mark  the 
best  clubs  ;  and  in  the  end  such  congregations 
generally  fall  upon  evil  days,  for  the  simple 
reason  that  the  people  who  are  attracted  to  them 
by  an  innate  club  instinct  discover  that  it  is  so 
much  easier  to  run  a  club,  and  so  much  pleasanter 
to  belong  to  one,  when  no  attempt  is  made  to 

232 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

mingle  spiritual  teaching  with  social  activity 
and  enjoyment.  Men  cannot  long  remain  loyal 
to  such  a  congregation,  and  their  disloyalty  is  a 
witness  to  the  haunting  power  of  a  truer  ideal. 
It  is  quite  beside  the  mark  to  compare,  as  is 
constantly  done,  the  contrarieties  and  dissensions 
which  mark  the  life  of  the  Church  with  the 
unanimity  and  hearty  good  fellowship  of  other 
associations  working  for  a  common  cause,  such 
as  the  Woman  Suffrage  movement.  These  asso- 
ciations work  for  ends  which  cover  only  a  rela- 
tively small  part  of  life,  are  easily  defined, 
and  admit  of  little  misunderstanding.  Their 
members  join  them,  not  because  they  wish  to 
learn  how  to  be  loyal  to  those  ends,  but  because 
they  are  already  convinced  that  those  ends  are 
for  their  own  good  and  for  the  good  of  the  race, 
and  their  one  desire  is  to  work  for  their  realisation. 
Obviously,  given  such  unanimity  of  aim,  these 
societies  will  run  smoothly  and  be  characterised 
by  a  high  degree  of  good  fellowship  and  self- 
denial,  for  they  operate  only  along  certain  definite 
and  circumscribed  lines  upon  which  all  their 
members  are  already  agreed.  What  differences 
emerge  are  differences  of  detail  and  method,  and 
any  disagreement  that  arises1  is  born,  not  of  out- 
raged convictions,  but  of  a  sense  of  personal 
injury.  This  means  that,  provided  its  members 
are  enthusiastically  convinced  of  the  main  issue 
and,  like  sensible  folk,  agree  to  suppress  purely 
personal    considerations    in    the    interests    of    a 

233 


Christianity  jn  the  New  Age 

common  cause,  such  a  society  is  bound  to  run 
harmoniously  and  effectively. 

But  when  we  turn  to  the  Church  we  are  dealing 
with  a  society  entirely  different  in  kind.  The 
Church  is  not  an  association  of  people  holding 
the  same  views  on  certain  subjects  and  largely 
alike  in  temperament  and  tastes.  The  Church 
is  the  society  of  those  who  profess  to  have  entered 
upon  a  new  type  of  life,  and  are  being  acclimatised 
by  degrees  to  a  new  atmosphere — a  process  not 
always  agreeable  to  behold.  The  Christian 
society  is  all-inclusive.  Indeed,  for  wealth  of 
human  contrasts,  there  is  nothing  more  striking 
than  an  average  congregation.  It  includes  adults 
and  children,  the  simple  and  the  learned,  the 
vigorous  and  the  feeble,  people  of  every  variety 
of  training,  taste,  talents  and  outlook.  They  are 
not  convinced  supporters  of  a  clear-cut  system, 
or  associated  to  carry  out  a  stereotyped  pro- 
gramme. Their  conception  and  interpretation 
of  Christianity  are  largely  in  flux  and  as  varied 
as  their  minds  and  temperaments,  and  the  bond 
of  their  union  cannot  be  summed  up  in  constitu- 
tions and  by-laws.  Strangely  mingled  and  blown 
together  from  all  quarters  of  the  moral  and 
spiritual  globe,  they  are  united,  at  the  lowest, 
by  their  conscious  need  of  God ;  at  the  highest, 
by  their  common  love  of  Jesus.  When  the  critic 
tells  us  that  that  love  ought  to  make  them  united 
in  spirit  and  overflowing  with  good  will  towards 
all  men,  we  of  course  agree,  and  there  is  no  con- 

234 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

gregation  that  has  not  in  its  midst  those  who 
have  so  learned  Christ.  But  the  Church  is  not 
a  ready-made  institution.  It  is  a  body  in  the 
making,  a  society  of  those  who  are  learning, 
awkwardly  and  blunderingly,  to  walk  in  newness 
of  life,  who  are  growing  slowly  into  apprehension 
of  a  truth  whose  fullness  is  beyond  their  highest 
attainment,  and  who  are  being  initiated  into  a 
love  that  redeems  by  blood.  Add  to  these 
learners — many  of  them  woefully  backward  and 
dull — the  merely  nominal  members  who  inevit- 
ably attach  themselves  to  such  a  society  and 
become  its  reproach  and  scandal,  and  it  follows 
that  the  Christian  Church  cannot  be  compared 
to  any  other  association  —  that,  indeed,  its 
assimilation  to  the  club  type  would  be  its  final 
condemnation.  For  the  Church  represents  a 
kingdom  extending  over  the  whole  of  life, 
and  a  truth  which  needs  every  type  of  mind  to 
contribute  to  its  right  understanding.  It  is, 
therefore,  precisely  as  her  members  gain  strong 
individual  convictions  as  to  the  application  of 
Christianity  to  given  departments  of  life,  and 
intimate  individual  insight  into  some  aspect  of 
the  truth,  i.e.,  as  they  enter  the  region  where 
disagreement  and  contention  are  almost  in- 
evitable, that  they  grow  into  true  membership 
of  Christ's  Body. 

It  is  hard  to  make  the  mind  of  to-day  realise 
that  outward  unity  and  concerted  action — the 
things  it  admires  so  much  in  an  army — are  not 

235 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

essential  marks  of  the  Church  of  Christ ;  that, 
indeed,  they  may  be  signs  of  decay  and  death. 
It  is  at  this  point  that  most  present-day  Church 
Union  movements  are  based  upon  unsound  prin- 
ciples. They  assume  that  Churches  have  the 
right,  and  even  the  duty,  to  compromise  upon 
matters  of  doctrine  and  spiritual  conviction  ;  with 
a  view  to  what  is  termed  "  the  more  effective 
mobilisation  of  Christian  forces/ '  But  the  unity 
which  Christ  pleaded  for  does  not  come  by  any 
kind  of  compromise.  If  the  underlying  sense  of 
oneness  in  Christ  Jesus,  the  spiritual  union  of  a 
common  redemption  and  a  common  calling, 
cannot  make  itself  manifest  in  presence  of  widely 
differing  convictions  on  faith  and  order,  each 
denominational  body  respecting  the  convictions  of 
the  other  but  remaining  unflinchingly  loyal  to 
its  own  vision,  no  scheme  of  corporate  union 
will  bring  true  unity  one  whit  nearer.  The  Free 
Churches  in  England  have  before  them  a  scheme 
for  federation  as  distinct  from  corporate  union, 
one  of  the  main  practical  considerations  being 
the  prevention  of  that  overlapping  which  has 
long  been  a  scandal  in  town  and  country  alike. 
It  is  by  no  means  the  first  attempt  to  cope  with 
the  problem,  but  all  such  endeavours  have  been 
more  or  less  ignored  by  the  parties  concerned. 
One  of  the  aims  of  the  new  federation  scheme 
is  to  provide  machinery  which  cannot  be  ignored, 
i.e.,  a  Council  consisting  of  authorised  repre- 
sentatives of  the  denominations  concerned.     This 

236 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

means  that  what  practically  amounts  to  compulsion 
is  to  be  employed  to  secure  what  sheer  Christian 
decency,  to  mention  no  higher  motive,  ought  to 
have  secured  long  ago  without  any  outside 
intervention. 

There  is  always  a  tendency  on  the  part  of 
ecclesiastics  to  emphasise  what  must  be  called 
the  prudential  aspect  of  Church  Union,  or  of 
Federation,  urging  upon  Churches  animated  by 
no  spontaneous  prompting  that  union  spells 
greater  influence  in  public  questions,  a  more 
popular  appeal,  and  the  effective  mobilisation  of 
spiritual  forces.  But  a  genuine  union  movement 
can  only  spring  from  a  vital  impulse  within  the 
membership  of  the  Churches ;  and  such  an 
impulse  does  not  come  into  being  at  the  sug- 
gestion of  a  committee.  It  can  be  preached  as 
a  spiritual  crusade  ;  it  cannot  be  engineered  into 
existence.  Least  of  all  can  it  be  evoked  by  an 
exposition  of  the  advantages  of  union.  It  is 
not  the  promise  of  heightened  prestige  that  will 
weld  the  Church  into  one  :  it  is  the  call  to  sacri- 
fice and  to  suffer.  A  union  entered  upon  under 
ecclesiastical  pressure  and  from  motives  of  utility 
is  destined  to  break  down.  The  utmost  it  can 
do  is  to  impress  a  certain  section  of  the  public, 
and  one  cannot  think  it  will  be  a  very  large 
section.  The  "  man  in  the  street  "  is  far  too 
shrewd  not  to  see  the  real  motive,  and  will 
frame  his  estimate  accordingly.  The  de- 
liberations   of    Churches    are    common    property 

237 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

nowadays,  and  every  newspaper  reader  knows 
that  it  is  a  sense  of  decline  and  the  melan- 
choly testimony  of  half-empty  churches  and 
waning  statistics  which  have  given  such  desperate 
urgency  to  the  union  question.  Should  federa- 
tion be  achieved,  every  intelligent  man  will 
regard  it  as  a  counsel  of  despair  which,  even 
if  carried  with  enthusiasm  at  headquarters,  is 
adopted  with  only  scant  good  grace  locally. 
It  requires  considerable  naivete  to  imagine  that 
such  men  will  mistake  a  policy  of  expedience  for 
the  expression  of  Christian  love. 

One  would  not  wish  to  minimise  for  a  single 
moment  the  scandal  and  stain  of  denominational 
rivalry,  or  the  ugliness  of  the  conventional  atti- 
tude of  "  Church  "  towards  "  Dissent/'  Nor  is  it 
possible  to  exaggerate  the  evil  of  a  loveless  and 
self-absorbed  Church,  split  by  petty  internal 
quarrels  and  heedless  of  the  need  of  a  world  of 
men.  But  the  remedy  for  these  evils  lies  not 
in  sinking  to  the  club  level,  or  in  seeking  to  enforce 
external  union.  That  is  not  the  way  of  adven- 
ture ;  it  is  an  illicit  short  cut.  The  way  of 
adventure  is  infinitely  harder.  The  adventurous 
Church  is  the  Church  which,  in  days  when  far 
other  ideals  prevail,  has  the  courage  to  remind 
herself  and  others  of  her  true  character  as  the 
Body  of  Christ,  and  of  her  primary  function  as  a 
witness  to  a  new  life  and  to  the  fellowship  of 
the  redeemed. 

When  we  turn  to  the  New  Testament,  we  find 

238 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

that  while  no  other  book  in  the  world  lays  such 
commanding  emphasis  upon  the  individual  and 
inward  character  of  true  religion,  it  is  also  em- 
phatically the  book  of  the  Church.  Its  back- 
ground is  the  Christian  community — a  community 
founded  upon  the  redeemed  personality,  yet 
something  far  more  than  a  mere  association  of 
persons  ;  an  organic  whole,  whose  corporate  life 
is  something  over  and  above  the  sum  of  the  lives 
of  its  members  ;  the  body  of  believers,  who  can 
give  to  God  together  that  which  not  the  greatest 
of  them  can  give  to  God  by  himself.  The  primitive 
Church  as  reflected  in  St.  Paul's  Epistles  was  no 
ideal  society.  It  was  torn  by  violent  and  often 
ignoble  dissensions,  marred  by  spiritual  crudeness, 
weakened  at  times  by  an  explicitly  carnal  temper, 
imperilled  by  frequent  relapses  into  pagan  im- 
morality; it  was,  in  short,  open  to  the  gravest 
and  most  unanswerable  criticism.  Yet  St.  Paul, 
whose  pen  set  down  its  weaknesses  and  defections 
with  such  remorseless  fidelity,  sees  it  as  the 
Body  and  Bride  of  Christ,  an  extension,  as  it 
were,  of  the  Incarnation.  Christ  is  her  Head  ; 
her  life  is  inextricably  intertwined  with  His 
Divine  life.  Such  a  Church-consciousness  lies  at 
the  very  root  of  New  Testament  Christianity, 
and  our  present-day  criticism  of  the  Church  fails 
because  we  have  no  great  constructive  doctrine 
of  the  Church  to  determine  and  guide  it.  It  is 
only  as  we  see  her  defects  as  blemishes  and  wounds 
in  the  Body  of  Christ  that  our  criticism  will  be 

239 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

profound  and  searching  enough  to  probe  her 
sore.  There  is  no  room  for  unreality  here.  To 
see  the  Church  as  the  Body  of  Christ  does  not 
mean  to  ignore  her  actual  condition,  but  to 
discern  the  Church  that  is  yet  to  be  actualised. 
We  are  not  yet  a  Church  ;  we  are  growing  a 
Church,  just  as  we  are  slowly  evolving  a  soul. 
The  Church  that  is,  exists  for  the  sake  of  the 
Church  that  is  to  be ;  and  it  is  only  in  the  name 
of  the  Church  that  is  to  be  that  we  may  presume 
to  lay  the  finger  of  blame  upon  the  Church  that 
is.  There  is  only  one  hope  for  the  Church,  and 
that  is  her  growing  to  be  actually  what  she  is 
already  potentially  and  ideally — the  Body  of 
Christ  bearing  His  marks,  having  fellowship  in 
His  sufferings,  caring  more  for  His  travail  than 
for  a  creditable  balance-sheet,  concentrating 
not  upon  the  social  amenities  of  the  4  common 
room,  but  upon  the  sacrificial  fellowship  of  the 
altar. 

This  conviction  pledges  us  to  the  difficult  and 
unpopular  task  of  witnessing  to  the  New  Testa- 
ment doctrine  of  the  Church,  and  seeking  to 
build  up  the  Christian  society  in  conformity 
with  it.  The  programme — if  such  it  can  be  called 
— seems  dry  and  uninviting  by  the  side  of  social 
campaigns  and  other  popular  movements  ;  but 
it  enshrines  that  victorious,  creative  principle 
which  in  Apostolic  times  built  a  new  world  out 
of  the  ruins  of  an  old  one,  and  has  been  the  soul 
of  every  vital  and  fruitful  movement  throughout 

240 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

the  Church's  history.  We  stand  for  a  Church, 
not  "broad-based  upon  the  people's  will,"  but 
deeply  grounded  in  her  Lord's  Being — a  Sacra- 
mental^ Church,  exemplifying  y  within  the  State  a 
new  type  of  life  destined  to  supersede  the  State. 


Ill 

To    say    that    the    primary   function    of   the 
Church  is  worship  is  to  run  counter  to  present- 
day  feeling ;  yet,   did  we  only  go  deep  enough, 
we  would  surely  recognise  that  the  instinct  for 
worship  lies  deep  in  humanity,  and  is  often  not 
merely  present  but  clamant  when  outward  appear- 
ances least  betray  it.     But,  as  we  have  pointed 
out  before,  there  is  a  widespread  indifference  to 
worship,  due  to   the   fact  that  while  preaching, 
social  effort,   and   other   Church   activities  have 
to  a  greater  or  lesser  extent  kept  pace  with  the 
times,    public    worship    has   remained    stagnant, 
and  largely  tends,  not  merely  to  bore,  but  actually 
to  irritate,  the  man  of  candid  mind  who  is  not 
versed  in  its  traditional  phraseology,  and  whose 
sense  of  reality  is  outraged  by  its  convention- 
alities.    Yet  worship  is  the  natural  expression  of 
the  redeemed  life  ;    it  rises  and  falls  with  the 
flow  and  ebb  of  the  soul.     Wherever  formalism, 
or  a  false  sense  of  corporateness,  has  weakened 
the  individual's  hold  upon  God,  there  worship  is 
not  the  spontaneous  outcome  of  life  but  a  theo- 
retical problem.     In  such  a  case  discussion  and 
Q  241 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

small  reforms  are  of  little  avail,  and  the  "  new  " 
Catholicism  is  as  powerless  to  raise  the  dead  as 
the  "  old  "  Protestantism.  It  is  at  such  times, 
when  life  has  failed  at  its  sources,  that  attempts 
are  made  to  introduce  a  liturgical  form  of  worship 
into  the  Free  Churches.  That  there  is  something 
in  a  liturgical  form  of  worship  which  meets  a 
real  need,  and  saves  from  many  devotional  ex- 
cesses and  excrescences,  will  be  conceded  by 
most  thinking  men.  Many  not  trained  in  liturgical 
forms  are  welcoming  them  now  as  an  important 
element  in  worship  ;  but  the  conviction  remains 
with  them  that  the  minister  who  surrenders  his 
right  to  voice  the  soul  of  his  people  in  favour 
of  a  purely  liturgical  service,  is  proclaiming  his 
bankruptcy  and  committing  the  Church  to  im- 
poverishment and  retrogression.  We  have  to 
beware  of  trying  to  meet  a  fundamental  evil 
with  such  superficial  remedies  as  a  change  in  the 
form  of  worship.  That  change  stimulates  the 
soul  is,  of  course,  a  psychological  fact ;  but  here 
as  everywhere  it  holds  that  we  must  first  make 
the  tree  good  and  the  fruit  will  take  care  of  itself. 
Given  a  Church  that  realises  her  responsibility 
as  the  awakener  and  nourisher  of  spiritual  life, 
worship  will  once  more  become  a  living  spring. 

An  Anglican  chaplain,  commenting  upon  the 
fact  that  class  prejudice  and  snobbery  disappear 
when  men  are  actually  facing  the  foe,  but  reassert 
themselves  in  exact  proportion  to  the  men's  dis- 
tance  from   the  firing  line,   remarked   th&t   the 

242 


The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

reason  why  the  Church  is  torn  and  weakened  by 
petty  disputes  and  mean  rivalries  is  that  she  has 
never  really  "  gone  over  the  top."     The  ignoble 
dissensions  which  flourish  in  the  atmosphere  of 
her    ordinary    services   would    soon    disappear — 
they  do,  in  fact,  disappear — the  moment  she  goes 
forth    to    war.     Let    her    set    herself    to    tackle 
seriously  the  great  problems  of  poverty,  ignor- 
ance and  vice,  and  good-bye  to  all  petty  wrang- 
lings  !     Lifelong  prejudices  and  antagonisms  have 
a  way  of  melting  into  thin  air  when  the  servants 
of  Christ  meet  at  the  deathbeds  of   the  poor  to 
join  .in  challenging  the  grim  forces  of  evil  that 
threaten  the  life  of  the  nation.     This  contention, 
however,    while    expressing    an    obvious    truth, 
rests  upon  a  false  conception  of  worship.      To 
assume  that  the  regular  ordinances  of  the  Church 
are  a  shallower  thing  than  its  philanthropy,  or 
even  its  evangelism,  is  to   stand   on    dangerous 
ground.     Did  we  but  realise  it,  there  is  nothing 
more  wonderful  in  a  world  full  of  wonders  than 
a  company  of  human  beings  lifting  their  hearts 
>to  God  in  unity.     There  is  nothing  more  tran- 
scendently  wonderful  than  a  body  of  believers 
met  to  adore  and  praise  their  Lord  and  Saviour 
— nothing  more    fit  to  make  wise  men  tremble 
and    strong  men  bow  their   souls  in  reverence. 
Nor  is  true  worship  the  tame  and  static  thing 
which  this  chaplain,  and  not  a  few  others,  assume 
it  to  be.      Where  it  is  static  it  lacks  the  specific 
quality  of  Christian  worship.     For  Christian  wor- 

243 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

ship  is  not  the  luxury  of  emotional  souls :  it  is 
a  battleground.  Wherever  a  soul,  or  a  company 
of  souls,  holds  real  converse  with  God,  there  rages 
a  battle  far  more  critical  and  momentous  than 
any  fought  in  the  slums  or  in  the  gilded  haunts  of 
vice.  Who  can  presume  to  estimate  the  Divine 
resources  set  in  motion  by  one  genuine  prayer, 
or  the  hostile  powers  let  loose  against  the 
praying  soul  ?  Had  we  but  eyes  to  see  and  ears 
to  hear,  we  could  not  enter  the  humblest  Christian 
assembly  without  seeing  the  air  thick  with  wings 
and  hearing  the  clash  of  contending  forces.  And 
if  a  worshipping  assembly  is  a  thing  of  majesty, 
it  is  also  a  thing  of  loveliness.  Could  we  but 
become  conscious  of  the  real  worship  of  the 
Christian  assembly,  could  we  but  hear  the  mighty 
and  moving  flow  of  the  deep  current  of  penitence 
and  adoration,  pleading  and  thanksgiving,  aspira- 
tion and  high  resolve,  that  runs  on  beneath  the 
audible  service,  our  criticism  of  its  weakness 
would  be  lost  in  an  intense  desire  to  make  some 
real  contribution,  however  slight  and  imperfect, 
to  that  hidden  stream.  There  is  ample  room 
for  frank  and  searching  criticism  of  our  public 
services ;  but  such  criticism  is  valid  only  in  the 
measure  in  which  we  have  a  right  conception  of 
the  nature  and  end  of  true  Christian  worship. 
Failing  that,  it  is  a  sheer  impertinence. 

One  does  not  need  to  borrow  the  grudging 
eye  of  the  hostile  critic,  in  order  to  realise  that 
our  public  worship  is  not  the  thing  of  awe  and 

244 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

beauty  which  God  intended  it  to  be.  We  have 
lost  that  sense  of  wonder  which  is  the  soul  of 
worship.  The  mysteries  of  the  spiritual  world 
do  not  dilate  our  hearts  and  bow  our  spirits,  and 
the  reason  why  our  worship  is  so  feeble  and 
passionless  is  because  it  is  not  born  of  a  genuine 
vision  of  the  God  who  can  only  be  seen  with 
eyes  of  wonder.  The  Wesleys  set  the  Christian 
heart  of  England  a-singing,  because  they  had 
recovered  the  sense  of  spiritual  wonder  for  their 
generation.  Their  hymns  throb  with  adoring, 
joyous,  passionate  worship,  because  they  are 
the  lyric  expression  of  wonder.  "  Where  shall  my 
wondering  soul  begin  ?  "  is  the  question  that 
pulses  through  them — a  question  the  average 
Christian  does  not  dream  of  asking  to-day.  For 
with  all  our  sharpened  discernment  and  heightened 
sensibility,  we  bring  dull  and  dreary  eyes  to  the 
mystery  of  a  Redemption  whose  roots  are  lost 
in  the  abysmal  being  of  God,  and  of  a  Grace  that 
is  the  very  flower  of  His  holy  Heart  of  Love. 
Nor  is  our  worship  eloquent  of  spiritual  joy. 
It  is,  indeed,  strangely  impotent  to  convey  the 
beauty  and  joyous  vitality  of  Christian  disciple- 
ship.  Men  who  chance  to  come  to  our  services 
and  meetings  find,  instead  of  the  sparkling  cup 
of  life  abundant,  the  stale  lees  of  mechanically 
accepted  religious  conventions.  Instead  of  a 
freshness  like  that  of  sunlit,  pulsing  seas,  they  find 
a  dullness  and  flatness  of  spirit  more  akin  to  the 
weariness  of  the  worldling  than  to  the  immortal 

245 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

youth  of  the  soul  that  lives  in  God.  In  place  of 
a  breadth  and  spaciousness  as  of  the  open  sky, 
they  are  conscious  of  a  protracted  horizon — a 
pettiness  of  soul  which  repels  their  most  generous 
instincts.  They  hear  prayers  for  the  prodigal 
recited  in  the  prim  and  frigid  tone  of  the  Elder 
Brother,  and  psalms  of  feasting  sung  by  men 
whose  pinched  aspect  spells  starvation. 

And  while  the  air  is  full  of  schemes  and  sug- 
gestions for  the  relief  of  this  famine  of  worship, 
some  of  the  methods  recently  tried  in  various 
quarters  are  based  upon  genuine  needs.  The 
movement,  especially,  known  as  the  Fellow- 
ship of  Silence  is  full  of  promise.  Silence  is 
not  merely  an  important  part  of  worship  :  it 
is  its  vital  atmosphere,  the  background  against 
which  the  spoken  word  utters  itself  with  com- 
pelling power.  Corporate  silence,  rightly  under- 
stood, is  a  strong,  soldier-like  attitude,  having 
nothing  in  common  with  the  vacant  day-dreaming 
and  deliberate  self-hypnotism  that  are  substituted 
for  it  in  certain  latter-day  cults.  It  is  not  merely 
a  subduing  and  stilling  of  the  soul  under  the 
power  of  God's  presence  :  it  is  a  going  forth  of 
the  whole  personality  towards  God  in  active 
resolution  and  aspiration.  It  is  a  great  and 
sorely  neglected  discipline,  making  a  highway 
for  God  through  the  wilderness  of  our  vagrant 
thoughts  and  wayward  emotions.  It  reveals 
what  speech  conceals,  eating  away  our  hidden 
unrealities,  showing  us  our  bankruptcy,  revealing 

246 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

the  emptiness  that   so  often  underlies   our  glib 
devotions. 

But  the  adventurous  Church  will  go  behind 
schemes    and    suggestions    to    the    fundamental 
lack   in  our  worship.     In   the   last  resort,   men 
remain  untouched  by  awe  and  wonder  and  un- 
irradiated by  joy,  not  because  the  conventional 
forms  of  worship   do    not  give    scope   to   these 
qualities,  but  because  they  have  never  really  seen 
God  as  their  Maker  and  Redeemer.     It  was  never 
more   true  than  to-day  that  while  many  have 
heard  of  God  by  the  hearing  of  the  ear,  few  can 
say,  "  Mine  eyes  have  seen  Thee."     The  Church's 
supreme  task,  no  matter  what  her  friends  advise 
or  her  enemies  reproach  her  with,  is  to  tell  men 
that  there  is  a  direct,  immediate,  transforming 
vision  of  God  ;    that  they  can  see  Jesus  and  be 
clothed  with  His  deathless  life — nay,  that  to  see 
God  thus  is  man's  first  business,  beside  which  all 
worldly  gain  and  all  merely  external  morality 
or  philanthropy  are  as  dross.     The  Church  that 
dares  to  utter  this  burden,  regardless  of  the  jibes 
and  reproaches  she  is  sure  to  incur  from  those 
who  construe  her  mission   in  social  and  philan- 
thropic terms,  is  the  Church  that  will  conquer 
with  the  victory  of  God.     Once  she  has  really 
staked  her  very  existence  upon  the  great  adven- 
ture, she  will  no  longer  ask:  How  large  is  my 
membership  ?     How  many  scholars  can  my  schools 
boast  of  ?     How  can  I  fill  my  buildings  and  keep 
my  funds  in  a  flourishing  condition  ?     Her  great 

247 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

questions  will  rather  be:  How  many  within  my 
pale  know  God  in  any  deeper,  more  dynamic  way 
than  as  a  good,  kind,  almighty  Being,  concerned 
with  their  temporal  welfare,  and  possibly  a  few 
urgent  spiritual  needs  ?  How  many  have  so  seen 
Jesus  that  they  have  indeed  become  other  than 
they  were  ?  How  many  of  my  workers  are 
dominated  by  a  vision  which  sees,  beyond  philan- 
thropic and  religious  activities,  a  Kingdom 
which  is  peace  and  joy  and  love  in  the  Holy 
Spirit  ?  How  many  of  those  who  have  come 
within  the  range  of  my  influence  have  been  stirred 
to  pant  after  God  as  the  hart  panteth  after  the 
waterbrooks  ?  The  ages  wait  for  the  Church  that 
can  look  upon  the  man  who  asks  for  a  fair  chance 
in  life,  and  dares  to  say  to  him  first  of  all,  "  Thy 
sins  be  forgiven  thee  "  ;  who  can  face  the  masses 
that  come  to  her  for  material  relief  but  care 
little  for  their  inward  misery,  and  say  boldly, 
"  Silver  and  gold  have  I  none ;  but  such  as  I  have 
give  I  thee  :  in  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ  of 
Nazareth,  rise  up  and  walk." 

We  are  told  again  and  again  that  men  nowa- 
days are  temperamentally  averse  to  the  inward 
and  worshipful  side  of  religion  ;  that  the  only 
way  to  approach  them  is  through  their  social 
sympathies.  That  is  not  so,  however.  The 
human  heart  has  not  lost  its  ancient  craving 
for  a  God  to  worship  and  adore.  Not  long  ago 
a  clergyman  noticed  five  rough  men  who  on  a 
rainy  night  had  dropped  in  to  a  popular  service. 

248 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

They  evidently  felt  supremely  uncomfortable  in 
their  unaccustomed  surroundings,  and  tried  to 
relieve  their  feelings  by  whispering,  chuckling, 
fidgeting  about  in  their  seats,  showing  in  every 
possible  way  their  not  ill-natured  contempt  for 
the  whole  proceedings,  and  finally  walking  out 
in  the  middle  of  a  prayer  to  the  great  relief  of 
their  neighbours.  The  following  week  the  clergy- 
man, in  paying  an  evening  call  on  one  of  his 
parishioners,  met  one  of  those  five  men  on  the 
stair.  He  was  living  in  the  house,  and  just 
about  to  leave  for  the  Front.  The  clergyman 
invited  himself  to  his  room  for  a  free  and  easy 
chat,  and  was  greatly  surprised  when  the  man, 
gulping  down  his  shyness,  asked  him  to  pray. 
He  did  so,  and  then  his  host  told  him  how  "  queer  " 
he  and  his  mates  had  felt  that  night  in  church, 
sitting  among  all  those  "  toffs  "  who  knew  exactly 
what  to  do.     They  felt  glad  to  get  out  of  it, 

but "  We   wouldn't   mind   praying   and   all 

that  sort  of  business  if  we  knew  a  bit  more  about 
it.  There's  something  in  it,  you  know.  We 
weren't  brought  up  religious,  never  bothered 
about  God  ;  but  we've  often  said  to  one  another, 
This  sort  of  life  isn't  half  good  enough.  You 
know  what  I  mean."  Wherever  one  goes,  in 
train  or  omnibus,  club  or  workshop,  one  comes 
across  men  and  women  discussing  eagerly,  and 
often  with  an  unashamed  wistfulness,  the  deep 
things  of  religion.  Is  it  possible  to  know  God, 
to  hear  His  voice,  to  be  conscious  of  a  call  from 

249 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

the  deeps  to  the  deeps,  to  see  with  a  clearness 
that  cannot  be  denied  the  things  eternal,  to 
possess  a  new  power,  a  new  motive,  a  hidden, 
living  spring  of  joy  and  healing  which  sweetens 
all  bitterness  and  makes  the  wilderness  of  life 
to  blossom  as  the  rose  ?  These  are  the  questions 
that  meet  us  on  the  lips  of  not  a  few  whom 
theorists  write  down  as  impervious  to  the  mystical 
aspect  of  religion. 

And"  in  answering  these  questions  through 
her  worship,  the  Church  must,  as  we  have  already 
said,  put  the  sacramental  and  the  sacrificial 
element  into  its  very  centre.  For  the  vision 
must  begin  in  the  household  of  faith.  Though 
the  moving  of  a  leaf  in  the  garden  may  reveal 
God  to  the  soul  as  effectively  as  a  sermon,  yet 
neither  the  ministry  of  nature  nor  the  spoken 
word  is  the  deepest  channel  of  that  revelation. 
It  is  not  with  the  eye  of  the  mind  that  we  see 
God,  but  with  the  love  of  the  heart ! 

Here,  O  my  Lord,  I  see  Thee  face  to  face  ; 
Here  would  I  touch  and  handle  things  unseen. 

It  is  through  a  Sacrament  which  represents  God's 
uttermost  self-giving — through  a  Divine  Act 
in  which  the  floods  of  our  devotion  and  con- 
secration are  unsealed,  as  the  greater  floods  of 
Christ's  mighty  passion  beat  upon  the  gates  of 
selfishness  and  low  desire— that  we  shall  see  God 
and  live. 


250 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 


IV 

Nor  can  worship  alone  create  and  sustain 
that  vision  on  a  large  scale  ;  *  it  must  be  con- 
joined with  the  preaching  of  the  Word.  History 
makes  short  work  of  the  contention  that  preach- 
ing "  may  be  necessary  in  a  weak  and  languishing 
state,  but  it  is  an  instrument  which  Scripture,  to 
say  the  least,  has  never  recommended."  f  Wher- 
ever worship  has  been  disjoined  from  preaching 
for  any  length  of  time,  it  has  degenerated  into 
mechanism  and  superstition,  taking  on  grotesque 
forms  and,  in  not  a  few  instances,  actually  pro- 
moting profanity  rather  than  reverence.  Christian 
opinion  has  always  swung  to  extremes  in  its 
estimate  of  the  importance  of  preaching.  On  the 
one  hand,  it  has  relegated  the  preacher  to  the 
lowest  place  in  the  economy  of  the  Church,  and 
assented  to  conditions  under  which  pulpit  genius 
could  not  come  to  its  own  ;  on  the  other  hand,  it 
has  made  of  its  places  of  worship  mere  "  preach- 
ing-stations/ '  put  the  sermon  at  the  centre  of 
worship — if  worship,  indeed,  it  could  be  called — 
regarded  what  is  the  heart  and  soul  of  worship 
as  mere  ."  preliminaries/ '  Both  extremes  are 
detrimental  to  true  worship.  In  the  one  case, 
worship  becomes  unintelligent,  and  crawls  blindly 
where  it  ought  to  soar  ;    in  the  other,  worship 

*  That  it  can  do  so  in  individual  cases  is  not  denied, 
f"  Tracts  for  the  Times,"  quoted  in  J.  H.  Blunt's  "  Direc- 
torium  Pastorale,"  p.  99- 

251 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

is  swamped,  not  necessarily  by  intellectual  in- 
terests— the  type  of  preaching  which  reduces 
worship  to  an  irksome  accessory  is  not  nearly 
as  intellectual  as  it  seems — but  more  often  by 
a  preoccupation  with  the  romantic  and  emotional, 
if  not  sentimental,  aspects  of  religion. 

We  have  dealt  elsewhere  with  the  importance 
of  the  pulpit  as  a  teaching  institution.  Here  we 
are  concerned  with  the  relation  of  the  Preacher 
to  the  life  of  the  Church.  There  are  signs  of  a 
revival  of  the  tendency  to  consider  preaching 
as  an  art  and  a  profession,  and  to  advocate  a 
class  of  pulpit  specialists  analogous  to  the  Preach- 
ing Orders  in  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  or,  at 
least,  to  set  men  of  commanding  pulpit  gifts 
free  to  serve  the  whole  Church,  instead  of  con- 
fining their  influence  within  the  bounds  of  in- 
dividual congregations — a  course  which  for  long 
has  been  the  custom  in  Wales.  A  strong  point 
in  its  favour  is  the  stimulus  it  gives  to  a  truly 
prophetic  ministry.  We  need  the  preacher  who, 
untrammelled  by  previous  knowledge  of  his 
audience,  shall  utter  the  word  the  Lord  has 
put  into  his  mouth,  without  stopping  to 
wonder  if  anyone  present  is  ripe  to  receive  it. 
Such  a  preacher  will,  for  example,  voice  a  stern 
and  searching  Divine  demand,  and  the  frivolous 
woman  he  does  not  know  and  cannot  see  from 
the  pulpit  will  so  respond  that  her  past  is  a 
dream,  and  her  life  begins  from  that  moment. 
Had  he  seen  her,  let  alone  been  acquainted  with 

252 


The  Gall  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

her,  he  might  have  toned  his  message  down  to 
her  supposed  capacity,  and  she  would  have 
remained  as  she  was.  It  is  for  lack  of  such 
preaching  that  many  a  God-haunted  soul  does 
not  get  out  of  the  twilight,  and  many  a  striving 
spirit  lingers  behind  its  destiny.  To  speak  the 
word  which  the  soul  did  not  dream  of,  but  which 
none  the  less  it  recognises  immediately  as  the 
key-word  of  its  life,  to  send  forth  the  fiery  arrow 
of  God  that  speeds  straight  to  an  unseen  mark, 
to  utter  the  vision,  though  it  be  as  to  the  blind 
— that  is  the  type  of  propheteia  for  lack  of  which 
whole  fields  ripe  unto  harvest  remain  unreaped. 
And  yet,  in  spite  of  this,  the  tendency  to 
pulpit  specialism  is  to  be  deprecated.  The 
Church  is  never  left  without  prophets  to  whom 
no  ordinary  rules  apply  ;  and  these  should  be 
liberated  to  follow  their  calling.  But  to  create 
a  class  of  mere  preachers  would  be  to  create  a 
type  of  preaching  perilous  to  the  preacher  himself, 
and,  in  the  long  run,  injurious  to  the  hearer. 
The  preacher  who  does  not  live  in  close  contact 
with  a  definite  community,  and  who  comes  into 
touch  only  with  those  who  are  attracted  by  his 
preaching,  tends  to  become  hard  in  proportion 
to  his  skill  in  rousing  the  emotions,  and  shallow 
in  proportion  to  his  constant  occupation  with 
the  deep,  prophetic  aspects  of  religion.  Except 
in  rare  cases,  the  preacher's  calling  is  to  be  a 
pastor  as  well  as  a  prophet,  and  a  priest  far 
more    than    a    mere    religious    consultant.     His 

253 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

privilege  is  to  preach  as  a  pastor ;  that  is, 
straight  out  of  his  intimate  and  sympathetic 
knowledge  of  his  own  people.  The  modern 
tendency  is  for  preachers  to  address  themselves 
either  to  a  section  of  their  congregation — that 
section  which  responds  to  their  message  and 
invites  their  personal  friendship — or  to  that 
mythical  monster  called  "  the  modern  mind/' 
Theoretically  speaking,  their  interests  and  sym- 
pathies range  over  a  far  wider  sphere  than  those 
of  their  predecessors  ;  in  reality,  their  scope  is 
often  far  narrower  than  that  of  many  an  old- 
time  parish  minister  who  lived  among  his  people 
and  knew  them  intimately  and  lovingly.  Men 
of  that  time  had  a  grip  and  a  "  bite  "  in  the  pulpit, 
a  mellowness  of  sympathy  and  a  shrewdness  of 
judgment,  which  present-day  preaching  largely 
lacks.  Nothing,  indeed,  is  more  characteristic 
of  the  modern  ministry  than  its  poor  skill  in  the 
cure  of  souls — an  art  which  neither  pastoral 
visitation  nor  private  consultation,  neither  the 
Bible  Class  nor  the  Confessional,  can  teach,  but 
which  is  the  secret  of  those  who  really  live  with 
souls,  sharing  their  joys  and  bearing  their  sorrows. 
It  is  for  want  of  such  long  and  patient  living 
alongside  of  their  people  that  preachers  of  to- 
day are  lacking  in  genuine  insight  into  concrete 
moral  and  spiritual  difficulties. 

Our  increasing  anxiety  to  draw  "  outsiders  " 
into  the  Church  has  made  the  preacher's  position 
doubly  difficult.     It  is  so  easy  for  preachers  of 

254 


The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

popular  gifts  to  gain  an  audience,  and  at  the  same 
time  lose  a  church ;  to  lecture,  rather  than 
preach,  on  popular  topics  so  interestingly  and 
piquantly  as  to  disappoint  and,  in  the  end,  alienate 
those  who  come  to  church  for  spiritual  reinforce- 
ment, teaching  and  comfort.  He  succeeds  in 
attracting  non-churchgoers,  but  he  has  lost  that 
Christian  community  atmosphere  which  is  his 
most  powerful  instrument  for  deepening  and 
spiritualising  that  attraction.  There  is  no  other 
way  of  reclaiming  a  neglected  child  than  by 
bringing  it  into  a  true  family  atmosphere.  What 
it  needs  is  a  home  ;  you  cannot  win  it  by  re- 
manding it  to  a  workhouse  and  instructing  the 
chaplain  to  give  it  weekly  lectures  on  gentleness 
and  affection.  The  preaching  that  merely  gathers 
an  audience  must  fail  unless  it  has  the  spiritual 
family  behind  it.  The  preacher  who  does  not 
build  a  church  writes  his  message  in  water.  He 
has  a  duty  to  his  own  people  which  no  amount  of 
enthusiasm  for  the  unchurched  masses  can  absolve 
him.  His  first  task  is  to  prophesy  to  the  dry 
bones — to  the  conventional,  worldly  church  mem- 
bers that  are  his  cross  ;  to  break  his  heart  over 
them,  to  spend  upon  them  some  of  that  passion 
and  persuasiveness  he  is  so  ready  to  pour  out 
upon  those  who  are  not  of  his  flock.  This  duty 
does  not  interfere  with  the  wider  ministry  to 
which  he  is  equally  called ;  on  the  contrary, 
to  neglect  it  is  the  surest  way  to  hinder  that 
wider  ministry.     The  Church  has  suffered  more 

^55 


Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

than  many  are  ready  to  admit  from  the  perversity 
of  preachers  who  imagine  that  it  is  over  the  bodies 
of  their  people,  so  to  speak,  that  they  can  best 
march  to  the  conquest  of  the  masses. 


V 

All  this  does  not  imply,  as  many  seem  to 
think,  a  narrow  "  conventicle  ideal,"  which  con- 
strues the  Church  asa"  little  Bethel  "  for  a  few 
pale  and  pious  souls,  regarding  a  small  member- 
ship as  the  outward  and  visible  sign  of  an  inward 
and  spiritual  grace.  What  it  does  imply  is  a  firm 
resolve  to  appeal  to  what  is  at  once  the  deepest 
and  the  most  universal  instinct  in  man — his 
affinity  for  the  living  God,  and  to  recall  men 
from  the  surface  life  of  the  senses  and  the  brain 
to  their  hidden  Centre.  To  say  that  this  narrows 
the  Church  is  a  libel  on  mankind.  The  Church 
that  resolutely  stands  for  the  spiritual  first,  and 
for  social  interests  only  as  the  natural  outcome 
of  a  truly  spiritual  conception  of  life,  may  not 
appeal  to  the  masses  in  the  sense  of  gathering 
large  crowds  (except  to  hear  preachers  of  out- 
standing ability)  ;  but  it  will  appeal  to  the  best 
in  every  man,  and  her  very  existence  will  be  a 
wholesome  prick,  a  haunting  reminder,  in  the 
minds  of  thousands  who  never  darken  her  doors. 
To  insist  that  mass-attraction  is  the  criterion 
of  the  Church's  health  is  to  fall  back  into  that 
vicious  habit  which  sees  the  supreme  object  of 

256 


The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

a  Church  in  touting  for  members  ;  in  other  words, 
in  struggling  to  keep  alive  and  vigorous.  Such 
a  Church  deserves  to  die.  But  once  we  recognise 
that  the  purpose  of  the  Church  is  not  a  continual 
membership  campaign,  but  to  serve  the  world 
in  Christ's  name,  and  that  her  best  service — the 
service  which  she  alone  can  render — is  to  bear 
living  witness  to  man's  new  life  in  Christ  Jesus 
and  to  incarnate  that  witness  in  a  community 
which  may  be  relatively  small  but  must  be 
genuinely  Christian,  the  question  of  attracting 
the  masses  sinks  into  sheer  irrelevancy.  The 
true  Church  will  be  alert  and  aggressive.  She 
will  use  the  best  insights  and  instincts  of  the  age, 
speak  to  men  in  the  language  of  the  day,  and 
proclaim  a  Gospel  to  which  nothing  human  is 
alien.  But  her  first  concern  will  be,  not  to 
vindicate  her  life,  but  to  live  it.  She  is  first  a 
witness,  and  only  second  an  apologist.  Her 
ministers  are  not  primarily  organisers  and  masters 
of  ceremonies,  who  can  turn  their  congregations 
into  cheerful  clubs  with  a  craze  for  small  philan- 
thropies ;  they  are  not  even  prophets  or  teachers 
merely,  but  priests  of  a  holy  community.  They 
are  there  to  build  that  Jerusalem  which  will  be 
the  praise  of  the  whole  earth.  Only  let  it  be 
built  truly  and  well  with  the  stones  of  sacrifice, 
and  every  road  thereto  shall  resound  with  the 
tramp  of  pilgrim  feet. 

It  is  out  of  the  Church's  deepest  life  that  her 
social  crusade  will  spring.     To-day  she  is  asked 

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to  take  her  rightful  place  at  last  as  the  leader  of 
humanitarian  crusades,  the  champion  of  the 
poor  and  weak,  and  the  terror  of  wealthy  evil- 
doers. The  demand  is  a  righteous  one,  and  it 
is  to  the  Church's  shame  that  it  still  remains  a 
mere  demand.  But  the  adventurous  Church, 
while  responding  to  it,  will  also  insist  that  judg- 
ment must  begin  with  the  House  of  God.  It  is 
not  the  dishonest  company  promoter,  the  trafficker 
in  human  beings,  the  wealthy  brewer  and  the 
conscienceless  capitalist  who  loom  most  largely 
in  her  membership ;  but  the  petty  profiteer,  the 
dishonest  tradesman,  the  conscienceless  artisan, 
the  small  employer  who  is  a  bully  and  a  skinflint, 
the  business  man  who  takes  advantage  of  his 
customers'  ignorance.  It  is  with  them  she  will 
deal  first.  This  is  not  a  question  of  comparing 
the  sins  of  petty  defaulters  with  the  crimes  of 
rich  oppressors.  The  point  is  that  these  petty 
defaulters  are  to  be  found  in  large  numbers  inside 
the  Church,  and  that  it  is  her  duty  to  address 
herself  to  them.  Such  a  course  demands  courage 
of  a.  type  almost  defunct  in  these  days,  when  we 
need  the  support  of  big  movements  and  influential 
platforms  to  stiffen  our  backbone  sufficiently  to 
denounce  evil.  It  involves  the  kind  of  preaching 
that  will,  in  some  cases,  leave  the  preacher  wonder- 
ing how  much  longer  he  will  be  allowed  to  occupy 
his  pulpit.  It  may  end  in  the  Church  having  to 
go  into  the  wilderness.  Nothing  strikes  one  as 
more  ominous  than  the  silence  of  the  Church  on 

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The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

such  a  subject  as  profiteering,  coupled  with  the 
persistent  tendency  of  the  pulpit  to  denounce 
social  evils  whose  representatives  or  advocates 
are  rarely  found  within  a  place  of  worship.  The 
need  is  for  preachers  who  will  make  their  own 
people  understand  that  social  service  is  not 
primarily  running  clubs  and  institutes,  sitting  on 
municipal  committees,  or  working  in  connection 
with  social  organisations ;  but  doing  honest  work 
— the  best  that  training  and  diligence  can  produce, 
and  the  most  useful  that  is  within  the  workers' 
capacity.  The  preacher  who  is  not  afraid  to 
tell  his  young  people  that  to  do  no  work,  or 
to  do  one's  work  badly,  perfunctorily  or  super- 
ficially, is  to  defraud  the  community  and  sin 
against  God  and  man,  and  who  will  persist  in 
preaching  this  bracing  doctrine  even  though  it 
means  that  the  best  of  his  young  people  decide 
to  attend  extra  evening  classes  instead  of  church 
clubs  and  societies,  is  a  true  prophet,  and  does 
social  service  of  the  best  type.  The  same  may 
be  said  of  the  preacher  who  attacks  boldly  the 
only  kind  of  competition  that  is  inherently  evil 
— competition  in  spending.  Who  does  not  know 
the  good  church-going  father  of  a  family  who 
makes  £800  a  year  more  or  less  dishonestly,  but 
would  infinitely  prefer  to  make  £200  a  year 
honestly,  did  not  his  womenfolk  insist  on  "  climb- 
ing "  in  the  social  scale  and  being  at  least  as  well 
dressed  and  as  luxuriously  housed  as  their  neigh- 
bours ?     The  Church  that  sets  her  face  like  a 

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Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

flint  against  a  pseudo-humanitarian  conception 
of  life  which  regards  the  minimum  of  work  and 
the  maximum  of  money  and  pleasure  as  the 
summum  bonunt,  holds  that  it  is  the  State's  chief 
function  to  relieve  the  individual  of  responsibility, 
and  expects  State  and  Church  to  unite  in  making 
moral  grit  unnecessary  by  removing  awkward 
temptations  out  of  people's  way,  is  the  truly 
adventurous  Church. 

To  say  that  the  Church  exists  to  witness  to 
a  new  life  and  to  witness  to  it  first  of  all  by 
living  it,  is  to  say  that  she  is  pledged  to  sacrifice. 
Those  who  read  the  .  many  articles  on  the 
defects  and  failings  of  the  Church  which  appear 
almost  weekly  in  our  newspapers,  written  for 
the  most  part  by  thoughtful  laymen,  must  be 
struck  by  the  fact  that  these  writers  very  rarely 
mention  Jesus  or  His  Cross  (except  as  a  symbol 
for  sacrifice  in  general),  and  by  their  almost 
unanimous  insistence  upon  a  teaching  ministry 
which  shall  make  Christianity  both  reasonable 
and  popular.  "  Religion,' '  says  one  of  them, 
"  must  be  taught  as  intelligently  as  any  science 
if  it  is  to  be  of  any  service  to  man."  If  one  were 
to  reply  that  the  kind  of  religion  that  the  Church 
stands  for — the  religion  of  Jesus  Christ — is  not  a 
thing  that  can  be  "  taught  "  in  the  intellectualist 
sense  of  the  term,  nor  a  thing  that  is  "of  service 
to  man  "  ;  that  it  is  a  life,  a  power  which  does 
not  wait  upon  man's  suffrages,  but  appropriates 
him   rather   than   is   appropriated   by   him,    one 

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The  Call  for  an  Adventurous  Church 

would  probably  be  written  down  as  a  narrow 
fanatic.  And  the  first  lesson  our  young  leaders 
and  prophets  have  to  learn  is  to  be  content  to 
be  accounted  mediaeval  and  fanatical  by  men 
of  really  fine  and  lovable  spirit,  in  sympathy  with 
much  that  Christ  lived  and  died  for.  This  is 
harder  by  far  than  to  endure  the  contempt  and 
hostility  of  men  of  coarse  fibre  and  evil  mind, 
who  lack  all  instinct  for  the  things  that  are  lovely 
and  of  good  report ;  but  it  is  the  only  way  for  a 
Church  that  has  taken  up  the  Cross.  This  is  a 
sacrifice  that  makes  no  dramatic  appeal,  excites 
no  sympathy  ;  evokes  only  impatience,  antagonism 
and  contempt.  It  is  so  hard,  indeed,  that  it 
can  only  be  made  in  union  with  Him  who  plumbed 
its  bitterest  deeps.  To  combat  the  good  which  is 
the  foe  of  the  best  takes  courage  of  the  noblest 
type,  the  courage  of  true  love. 

To-day  the  Church's  path  is  hid  in  mist. 
Only  one  thing  is  sure  :  the  Cross  waits  behind 
the  dim  shadows.  She  will  not  go  very  far  before 
she  will  be  called  to  sacrifice.  During  a  certain 
public  discussion  on  the  proposed  Free  Church 
Federation,  a  leading  representative  of  one  of 
the  Churches  concerned  tried  to  reassure  those 
who  were  shivering  on  the  brink  that  entrance 
into  the  Federation  involved  "  no  sacrifice  what- 
ever "  of  denominational  characteristics  ;  it  was 
nothing  more  alarming  than  a  scheme  for  mutual 
reinforcement  and  collective  effectiveness.  Un- 
wittingly the  speaker  laid  his  finger  upon  the 

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Christianity  in  the  New  Age 

most  damning  factor  in  all  such  schemes.  The 
Church  is  still  seeking  to  strengthen  and  enlarge 
herself  with  the  minimum  of  sacrifice.  The 
union  she  strives  for  is  not  the  meeting  of  brothers, 
in  which  much  is  joyfully  sacrificed  and  love  the 
only  end  ;  it  is  the  amalgamation  of  rival  firms 
who  know  themselves  too  weak  to  continue  rivals. 
Her  evangelism  is  not  a  selfless,  brave  witness, 
born  of  pure  love  to  God  and  man,  but  an  accom- 
modation with  a  view  to  popularity.  It  is  this 
calculating  temper  that  makes  one  tremble  for 
the  future  of  the  Church. 

Only  the  adventurous  Church  will  save  her 
soul  alive,  and  in  doing  so  will  save  the  world. 
The  adventurous  Church  does  not  scheme  or 
calculate.  She  has  no  programme  and  engineers 
no  campaigns.  She  lives  by  her  vision  of  God. 
Her  only  policy  is  to  follow  her  Lord.  She  sees 
Jesus  walking  in  the  midst  of  a  broken,  bleeding 
world,  and  she  asks  the  old  question,  Quo  vadis, 
Domine  ?  It  is  the  only  burning  question  in  the 
whole  world,  and  the  only  question  that  will  not 
long  remain  unanswered.  What  the  answer  will 
be  we  cannot  say  yet,  but  we  know  that  it  will 
be  eloquent  of  a  Cross.  In  that  sign  the  Church 
will  conquer  as  Christ  conquered. 


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